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Rising Wolf 
The White Blackfoot 




I LKANIiD OUT AND FIRKIJ ^TRAlCiHT Al A BK, HEAD ^p. 105) 



RISING WOLF 

THE WHITE BLACKFOOT 

HUGH MONROE'S STORY OF HIS 
FIRST YEAR ON THE PLAINS 

BY 

JAMES WILLARD SCHULTZ 

WITH ILLUSTRATIONS 
BY FRANK E. SCHOONOVER 




BOSTON AND NEW YORK 

HOUGHTON MIFFLIN COMPANY 

<^\)t I!!iter^iDe pvt^^ Cambtiti0e 

1919 






COPYRIGHT, 1918, BY THE SPRAGUE PUBLISHING COMPANY , 

COPYRIGHT, I9I9, BY JAMES WILLARD SCHULTZ 

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED 

\ 



iCI.A53651i 



NOV 



Contents 

I. With the Hudson's Bay Company 3 

II. The Sun-Glass 29 

III. Hunting with Red Crow 56 

IV. A Fight with the River People 79 
V. Buffalo Hunting 104 

VI. Camping on Arrow River 129 

VII. The Crows attack the Blackfeet 154 

VIII. In the Yellow River Country 179 

IX. The Coming of Cold Maker 205 

X. Making Peace with the Crows 230 



Illustrations 

I LEANED OUT AND FIRED STRAIGHT AT A BiG HeAD 

Frontispiece 

How Strange it seemed to me, a Boy, to sit in 
THE Prow io 

As THEY SWEPT PAST US THEY SHOT THEIR ArROWS 1 56 

Hugh Monroe in his Old Age 252 

From a photograph 

The drawings are by Frank E. Schoonover 



Introduction 

ONE of the greatest pleasures of my long life 
on the plains was my intimate friendship 
with Hugh Monroe, or Rising Wolf, whose tale of 
his first experiences upon the Saskatchewan- 
Missouri River plains is set forth in Rising Wolf 
just as I had it from him before the lodge fires 
of the long ago. 

At first an engage of the Hudson's Bay Company, 
then of the American Fur Company, and finally 
free trapper, Hugh Monroe saw more "new coun- 
try" and had more adventures than most of the 
early men of the West. During the last years of his 
long life he lived much with his grandson, William 
Jackson, ex-Custer scout, who was my partner, and 
we loved to have him with us. Slender of figure, and 
not tall, blue-eyed and once brown-haired, he must 
have been in his time a man of fine appearance. 
Honest he was and truthful. Kind of heart and 
brave. A good Christian, too, and yet with no small 

ix 



Introduction 

faith in the gods of his Blackfoot people. And he 

was a man of tremendous vitaHty. Up to the very 

last he went about with his loved flintlock gun, 

trapping beavers and shooting an occasional deer. 

He died in his ninety-eighth year, and we buried 

him in the Two Medicine Valley, under the shadow 

of the cliffs over which he had so many times helped 

the Pi-kun-i stampede herds of buffalo to their 

death, and in sight of that great, sky-piercing 

height of red rock on the north side of the Two 

Medicine Lake, which we named Rising Wolf 

Mountain. It is a fitting monument to the man who 

was the first of his race to see it, and the great 

expanse it overlooks. 

J. W. S. 



Rising Wolf 
The White Blackfoot 



HUGH MONROE'S STORY 
OF HIS FIRST YEAR ON THE PLAINS 



RISING WOLF 

THE WHITE BLACKFOOT 

• 

CHAPTER I 
WITH THE Hudson's bay company 

YOU ask me for the story of my life. My 
friend, it would fill many volumes, for I have 
lived a long life of great adventure. But I 
am glad! You shall have the story. Let us 
set it forth in order. So ! I begin : 

I was born in Three Rivers Settlement, 
Province of Quebec, July 9, 1798. My father 
was Captain Hugh Monroe, of the English 
Army. My mother was Amelie de la Roche, 
daughter of a noble family of French emigres. 
Her father owned a fine mansion in Montreal, 
and the large estate in Three Rivers, where 
my father lived with her what time he was 
not with his regiment on some expedition. 

3 



Rising Wolf 

My childhood days were quiet enough. I 
played with the children of our peasantry; 
a Jesuit Father, resident with us, taught me 
a smattering of reading and writing in both 
French and English; and presently I got a 
gun, a beautiful, light smoothbore carrying 
thirty balls to the pound. From that* time 
on it was always the gun with me. I ceased 
playing with the peasant children, and spent 
the most of my time hunting in the great 
forest surrounding the settlement. In my 
twelfth summer I killed my first deer. I shot 
two black bears when I was thirteen, and oh, 
how proud I was of that! An old pensioner 
of my mother's, a half-breed Montagnais In- 
dian, too old and feeble to do much himself, 
taught me to trap the beaver, the otter, and 
the land fur-bearers, the fox, fisher, marten, 
and mink, and I caught many of them. Every 
spring my Grandfather de la Roche sold the 
pelts for me in Montreal for a good price, one 
winter catch, I remember, bringing me in 

4 



With the Hudson's Bay Company 

thirty pounds, which was a large sum for a 
boy to earn in a few months' time. 
' After the beginning of 1812 I saw Httle of 
my father, for then, you know, began the war 
between the English and the Americans, and 
he was with his regiment here and there, and 
took part in several battles. It was in the 
autumn of that year that my grandfather sent 
for us to move in to Montreal and live with 
him. 

I did not like the town. I could neither 
hunt nor trap. I had little to do with the 
town boys; I did not understand their ways, 
so different from my ways. Mornings I at- 
tended the parish school; afternoons I rowed 
on the river, or visited in the warehouses of 
the Hudson's Bay Company, with which my 
grandfather had much to do. There I met 
voyageurs and trappers from far places — men 
dressed all in buckskin clothes, with strangely 
fashioned fur caps on their heads, and beaded 
moccasins encasing their feet. Some were 

S 



Rising Wolf 

French, and some English, the one race hav- 
ing Httle to do with the other, but that made 
no difference with me; I made friends with 
both factions, and passed many, many pleas- 
ant hours listening to their tales of wild ad- 
venture, of fights with Indians, encounters 
with fierce bears of the Far West, and of peril- 
ous canoe trips on madly running rivers. 

"That is the kind of life I want to lead," I 
said to myself, and, young as I was, began 
to importune my mother to allow me to en- 
gage with the great company. At first she 
but laughed at me. But as winter and sum- 
mer and winter went by, and I never ceased 
my entreaties, not only to her, but to my 
grandfather, and to my father when he visited 
us, it became a matter not to be dismissed 
with idle jests. 

And at last I had my way. "He was born 
for the adventurous life, and nothing else," 
said my father, "so we may as well let him 
begin now, and grow up to a responsible posi- 

6 



With the Hudson's Bay Company 

tion with the company. Who knows but he 
may some day become its governor!" 

It was my mother who objected to my 
going. Many a tear she shed over the little 
traveling-kit she prepared for me, and made 
me promise again and again that I would 
return to her, for a visit at least, at the ex- 
piration of my apprenticeship to the company. 
It was a fine kit that she got together for me, 
changes of underclothes, many pairs of stock- 
ings, several pairs of boots, an awl, and needles 
and thread, a comb and brush, and a razor, 
strop, and brush and soap. *'You will need 
the razor later on. Oh, just think! My boy 
will be a bearded man when he returns to me ! " 

"Not if I can keep the razor. I despise 
whiskers! Mustaches! They are unclean! I 
shall keep my face smooth," I told her, and 
I have done so to this day. 

When the time came for my going my father 
gave me a brace of silver-mounted pistols in 
holsters for the belt, and plenty of balls and 

7 



Rising Wolf 

extra flints for them. My grandfather gave 
me twenty pounds, and a sun-glass. ** There 
are times when flint and steel are useless, but 
as long as the sun shines you can always make 
fire with this," he told me. Little did we 
think what an important part it was to play 
in my first adventure upon the plains. 

At last the day for my departure came. 
We had breakfast by candlelight and then 
my grandfather took us and my kit down 
to the wharf in his carriage. I went into the 
office and signed articles of apprenticeship 
to the Hudson's Bay Company for five years, 
at twenty pounds per year, and found, my 
father and mother signing as witnesses. Where- 
upon the chief clerk gave me a letter to the 
factor to whom I was to report without un- 
due delay, Factor James Hardesty, at Moun- 
tain Fort, Saskatchewan River, foot of the 
Rocky Mountains, the company's new fort 
built for the purpose of trade with the Httle- 
known tribes of the ' Blackfeet, said to be a 

8 



With the Hudson's Bay Company 

very numerous people, and possessors of a 
vast hunting-ground teeming with beaver and 
other fur animals. 

My mother almost fainted when she learned 
how very far away was my destination. She 
wept over ' me, kissed me many times, and 
made me promise again and again that I would 
return to her at the end of the five years. And 
so we went from the office to the end of the 
wharf, where were the five big keel boats of 
the company, all loaded, and manned by the 
sturdy French and English voyageurs^ and I 
got into one of them with my kit, smoothbore 
in hand and pistols at my belt, and the men 
cast off and bent to their oars. As far as I 
could see them, my father and mother and 
grandfather kept waving their handkerchiefs 
to me, and I waved mine to them. I never 
saw them after that day! It was May 3, 1814, 
about two months short of my sixteenth birth- 
day. 

As I have said, there were five boats in the 

9 



Rising Wolf 

flotilla, and each one was loaded with four or 
five tons of goods for the Indian trade, every- 
thing being done up in waterproof packages 
of about one hundred pounds weight. The 
heavy goods were mostly guns, powder and 
ball and flints, tobacco, beads, beaver traps, 
and brass and copper wire for making brace- 
lets, and ear and finger rings, and axes, and 
copper and brass kettles of various size, and 
small hand mirrors. The lighter goods com- 
prised blankets, red, blue, and yellow woolen 
cloth, needles, awls, thread, and the many 
other articles and trinkets sure to take the 
Red Man's fancy. Not a very valuable cargo, 
you may say, nor was it there in Montreal. 
But at Mountain Fort, foot of the Rocky 
Mountains, it would be of enormous value. 
There a gun was worth sixty beaver pelts — 
sixty pounds' worth of fur — and all the other 
articles sold in the same proportion. Why, 
a yard of tobacco — it was in long twists like 
rope — sold there for two beaver skins! 

lO 




HOW STRANGE IT SEEMED TO ME, A BOY, 
TO SIT IN THE PROW 



With the Hudson's Bay Company 

I shall say little of our long journey to Moun- 
tain Fort. It was interesting, but as nothing 
compared to what I saw and experienced after 
arriving at my destination. We turned into 
the Ottawa River from the St. Lawrence. 
How strange it seemed to me, a boy, to sit in 
the prow as strong men drove us fast and 
faster toward that unknown land. 

We ascended the Ottawa as far as it was 
navigable, and then portaged our boats and 
cargoes from lake to lake across a divide, and 
finally, early in September, arrived at York 
Factory, on the Saskatchewan River, and close 
to where the stream empties into Hudson 
Bay. There we wintered, and set forth again 
as soon as the ice went out in the spring. En 
route I saw, for the first time, buffaloes, elk, 
and one or two grizzly bears, monstrously 
big bears they appeared to be, even at a dis- 
tance. I also saw some camps of Cree Indians, 
enemies of the Blackfeet, but friendly to the 
whites, and was told that they feared to visit 

II 



Rising Wolf 

the fort to trade when the Blackfeet were 
there. 

At last, after many weary days of rowing 
and cordeliing up the swift Saskatchewan, 
we arrived at Mountain Fort. It was the 
loth day of July, 1815. I had been a year 
and a couple of months on my way to it from 
Montreal! 

The fort, built of logs, the buildings roofed 
with poles and earth, was in a heavily tim- 
bered bottom above the high-water mark of 
the river. It was enclosed with a high, log 
stockade, and had a bastion at one corner, in 
which were two small cannon. It was later 
to be known as Bow Fort, as the stream it 
was upon, which was a main tributary of the 
Saskatchewan, was called by the Blackfeet 
Bow River. 

The fort bottom came suddenly into view 
as our boats rounded a sharp bend of the river, 
and my eyes and mouth opened wide, I guess, 
when I saw that its shore was crowded with 

12 



With the Hudson's Bay Company 

Indians, actually thousands of them. They 
had seen few white men, and few boats other 
than the round "bull boats" which they hastily 
constructed when they wanted to cross a river, 
and our arrival was of intense interest to 
them. 

. I noted at once that they were far different 
from all other Indians that I had seen on my 
long trip across the country. They were much 
taller, lighter of skin, and slenderly and grace- 
fully built. I marveled at the length of hair 
of some of the men; in some instances the 
heavy braids touched the ground; five feet 
and more of hair! A very few of thenx wore 
blankets; the rest were dressed in well-tanned 
leather — call it buckskin if you will — ^garments, 
sewed with sinew thread. But these were well 
made, and very picturesque, ornamented, as 
many of them were, with vivid embroidery 
of porcupine quills, dyed all the colors of the 
rainbow. Men, women, and children, they 
all, excepting the few possessors of our com- 

13 



Rising Wolf 

pany blankets, wore wraps, or togas, of buffalo 
cow leather, those of some of the men covered 
with bright-painted pictographs of their ad- 
ventures, and strange animals of their dreams. 
I noticed that few of the men had guns; the 
most of them carried bows and arrows in fur 
or leather cases and quivers at their backs. 
\ As we swept past the great crowd of people 
toward the landing, my heart went out to 
every one of them. I wanted to know them, 
these people of the plains, as yet unaffected 
and unspoiled by intercourse with the whites. 
Little did I think how very soon I was to know 
them, and know them intimately! 
■ At the landing the factor, Hardesty, and 
some of his employees, backed by a half-circle 
of chiefs, awaited our coming. Little attention 
was paid to me, just a boy. The factor greeted 
the head voyageur of our flotilla, then the men, 
and then seemed suddenly to discover me: 
"And you — " he stopped and stared at me, 
and said impatiently to one whom I afterward 

14 



With the Hudson's Bay Company 

learned was his clerk: **I asked for men, and 
they send me a boy!" 

Then he turned again to me and asked: 
"Well, young man, what brings you here to 
this wild land?" 

**I came to work, sir!" I answered, and 
handed him the letter which the company 
clerk had given me in Montreal. He read it 
and his manner toward me instantly changed. 

"Ah, ha! So you are Hugh Monroe, Junior!" 
he exclaimed. "And you have come out to 
grow up with the company! I know your 
father well, young sir. And your Grandfather 
de la Roche as well. Fine gentlemen they 
are. Well! Well! We shall find some use 
for you, I am sure." And he shook hands 
with me, and then, after a time, told me to 
accompany him to his quarters. 

We went up the broad beaten path in the 
timber to the fort, and the big, hewn timber 
gate swung open for us, and its keeper bowed 
low as he let us in. "We keep a guard here 

IS 



Rising Wolf 

night and day, and two men up there with 
the cannon. We have many Indians here- 
about, and as yet do not know them well," 
the factor told me. 

We went into his quarters, a big room with 
an enormous fireplace at one end. It had 
windows of thin, oiled rawhide, which let in 
a yellowish light. Its furniture was home- 
made and comprised a desk, several chairs, 
a bunk, piled high with buffalo robes and blan- 
kets, and an elkhorn rack supporting several 
guns. I was told to put my gun and pistols 
on the rack, that another bunk should be put 
up, and that this was to be my home for the 
present. 

We soon went out, for a long line of em- 
ployees was bringing in the cargoes from the 
boats, and the factor had to inspect them. I 
made my way to the upper floor of the bastion 
and entered into conversation with the two 
men on guard there with the cannon, and 
looked down now and then at the great crowd 

i6 



With the Hudson's Bay Company 

of Indians out in front of the stockade. Many 
of them had bundles of beaver and other fur 
which they were waiting to trade for the newly 
arrived goods. The watch told me that they 
had been encamped at the fort for two months 
awaiting the coming of the boats, and that 
they had more fur than the cargoes of the 
five boats could buy, unless the factor more 
than doubled the price of the goods. That 
did n't seem possible to me. 

"Why, how many Indians do you think 
are here?" asked one of the watch. 

"Three or four thousand.^" I hazarded. 

He laughed. "Make it thirty thousand, 
and you will come nearer hitting it," he told 
me, and I gasped. 

"There are a lot more than that," said the 
other watch, confidently. 

"Yes, I guess there are," the first went on. 
"You see, young fellow, we have here right 
now all three tribes of the Blackfeet, and their 
allies, the Gros Ventres, and Sak-sis. Yes, 

17 



Rising Wolf 

there 's probably between thirty and forty thou- 
sand of them, all told." 

Again I gasped. 

"Why, if they wanted to, they could take 
this fort without any trouble!" I exclaimed. 

"Take it! Huh! In just two minutes all 
would be over with us if they started in. These 
are the boys that keep them from doing .it," he 
said, and patted the cannon beside him. 

"You see that cottonwood tree out there, 
how its limbs are all splintered and dead?" 
said the other watch. "Well, we fired a four- 
pound charge of trade balls into it just to 
show them what it would do. There was a 
big crowd out there before the gate, as big 
as there is now, and when we touched her 
off you should have heard the women and 
children yell, and seen 'em run for cover. The 
men, most of them, jumped when the old gun 
boomed, but they stood their ground and 
stared and stared at the shower of leaves and 
twigs coming down. We then fired the other 

i8 



With the Hudson's Bay Company 

one, and down came about all of the rest of 
the tree-top. I bet you they said to one another: 
*It 's no use trying to take that fort; those big 
guns would cut us all down just as they did 
the tree-top ! ' " 

*'But we are taking no chances," said the 
other. "You see that little gate in the big 
gate.f* Well, when the Indians come to trade 
we let them in through it, a few at a time, 
making them leave their weapons outside, 
and just as long as the trade lasts we keep 
one of the cannon pointed to the door of the 
trade-room." 

"And do you never leave the fort and the 
protection of the guns?" I asked, thinking 
how hard it would be for me to remain shut 
up in the fort, never to visit in the camps of 
the Indians, or hunt the game with which the 
country teemed. 

" Oh, we go out whenever we want to," said 
one. " You see, they would n't pot just a few 
of us, for fear that they could n't trade here any 

19 



Rising Wolf 

more, and they are crazy for our goods. No, 
unless they can kill us all and take the fort 
at one swoop, we shall never be harmed by 
them, and it is only at a time like this, when 
the trade-room is full of goods, that there is 
any danger. Anyhow, that is the way I look 



at it." 



**And right you are," the other watch agreed. 

Just then the factor called to me that it 
was dinner-time, and I left the bastion and 
followed him into a room where the cook, a 
French-Huron woman, wife of one of the em- 
ployees, served us our simple meal. It con- 
sisted solely of buffalo meat and strong black 
tea, and the factor explained that he, as well 
as the employees, lived upon meat and the 
various fruits of the country, fresh and dried, 
the year around. Christmas was the one ex- 
ception; on that day every one had a generous 
portion of plum pudding with his meat dinner! 
You can see how it was in those days. Freight 
was a year en route to that far place from 

20 



With the Hudson's Bay Company 

Montreal, and every pound of it had to be 
merchandise for the Indian trade. At a rough 
guess I should say that every pound laid down 
at the fort was worth from three to twenty 
guineas per pound in fur. Copper wire made 
into bracelets and other jewelry, for instance, 
was worth a hundred guineas, a hundred beaver 
skins, per pound. Naturally, the orders from 
London were that factors and employees alike 
must be satisfied with the one big treat, plum 
pudding for the Christmas dinner! Well, it 
did n't matter. We became so accustomed to 
a meat diet that we gave little thought to 
other food. In summer, when in turn the 
service berries, choke-cherries, and bull berries 
ripened, we feasted upon them, and the women 
dried some for winter use, not enough, how- 
ever, for more than an occasional dish, stewed, 
and without sugar, rather flavorless. 

We finished our meal and some of the em- 
ployees took our place at the table after we 
went out.-^ Factors of the company did not 

21 



Rising Wolf 

eat with the men. In fact they did not asso- 
ciate with them. They held themselves aloof, 
and ruled their forts with stern justice. They 
generally issued their orders through their 
clerks. 

After the men had finished their dinner, 
the great occasion of the year, the trade, was 
opened by a feast to the chiefs of the different 
tribes. They came into the fort followed by 
their women, staggering under loads of fur, 
and the factor sat with them while they ate, 
and smoked with them afterward. After the 
pipe had gone the rounds, the chiefs one by 
one made speeches, very badly interpreted 
by a man named Antoine Bissette, a French- 
Iroquois half-breed who had married a Cree 
woman who had some knowledge of the Black- 
foot language, and through her had acquired 
a few words of it. Each chief made a long 
speech, and at the end of it the interpreter 
would say: "He says dat he is friend to whites. 
He say dat you his brudder. He say dat he 

22 



With the Hudson's Bay Company 

give you hees pack of furs what hees woman 
she has dere ! " 

"And what else did he say?" the factor 
would ask. 

"An' dat is all." 

"And that is all! Huh!" the factor ex- 
claimed. "Here we have had long speeches, 
matters of importance to the trade may have 
been touched upon, and you can't tell me what 
has been said! I told you a year ago, Antoine, 
to study this language, but you do not improve 
in it. If anything, your interpreting is worse 
than it was last spring!" 

"But what can I do? My woman, he is 
mad all the time. He say Blackfoot language no 
good; no will talk it. So, me, I no can learn." 

"Huh!" the factor again sputtered, and with 
a shrug of the shoulders and a wave of the 
hand, led the way to the trade-room. There 
he gave the chiefs good value for their furs, 
and presents besides, and they retired, well 
satisfied, to make room for their people. 

23 



Rising Wolf 

I spent all of the afternoon in the trade- 
room watching them, and saw much to in- 
terest and amuse me. The men, almost without 
exception, bought guns and ammunition, traps, 
and tobacco, and the women bought the finery. 
I saw one young woman pay twenty beavers 
for a white blanket, and proudly drape it 
around the stalwart form of her man. He 
wore it for a few minutes, and then put it over 
her shoulders, and when his turn came to trade 
he bought for her several skins' worth of copper 
jewelry. I saw many such instances during 
the trade of the next few days, and one idea 
of the Indians that I had — that the men took 
everything and merely tolerated their women, 
used them as mere slaves — went glimmering. 

The next morning the factor told me that 
he would give me the day off, and advised 
that I spend it in visiting the camps of the 
different tribes, located in the river bottoms 
above the post. He assured me that I should 
be perfectly safe in doing so, and said that 

24 



With the Hudson's Bay Company 

I had best leave my gun at home, so as to 
show the Indians that we regarded them as 
the friends that they professed to be. I did, 
however, thrust one of my pistols under my 
shirt-bosom and, upon Antoine's advice, wore 
a blanket Indian fashion, so the camp dogs 
would not bother me. 

Thus equipped, I set forth. 

I had a wonderful day, a day of a thousand 
surprises and intense interest. The trail to 
the next bottom above the fort ran over a 
point of the plain ending in a bank at the 
river, and looking out from it I saw that the 
plain for several miles was covered with 
the horses of the different tribes, actually thou- 
sands and thousands of them, all in bands of 
from sixty or seventy to two or three hundred 
head. I afterward found that each owner so 
herded his horses that they became attached 
to one another, and would not mix with other 
herds. 

From the point I looked down upon the 
25 



Rising Wolf 

camp in the next bottom, the camp of the 
Pi-kun-i, or so-called Piegans, the largest tribe 
of the Blackfoot Nation, and tried to count 
the lodges. I actually counted fourteen hun- 
dred and thirty, and afterwards estimated 
that there were four hundred more pitched 
in the timber bordering the river. Well, say 
that there were eighteen hundred lodges, and 
five persons to the lodge; that made a tribe 
of nine thousand people ! 

I went down into the camp, keeping an eye 
upon the great wolf-like dogs lying around 
each lodge. Children were playing everywhere 
around, and the river was full of them, swim- 
ming. Women were busy with their daily 
tasks, cooking meat, tanning leather, or re- 
moving the hair from hides with oddly shaped 
elkhorn hoes tipped with steel or flint, or else 
sitting in the shade of the lodges gossiping, 
and sewing garments with awl and sinew 
thread, or embroidering them with colored 
porcupine quills. Men were also gathered 

26 



With the Hudson's Bay Company 

in little groups, chatting and passing great 
stone-bowled, long-stemmed pipes from hand 
to hand. It was all a peaceful and interesting 
scene. 

I did not go through the whole camp; I 
somehow felt bashful before so many people; 
but as far as I went all smiled at me pleasantly 
as I passed, and spoke to me in kindly tones. 
How I wished that I could know what they said! 
How I wanted to know the meaning of the 
strange symbols with which some of the lodges 
were painted! On some were paintings of 
animals; buffalo, otter, beaver, deer, all with 
a red line running from the mouth back to a 
triangular figure in red in the center of the 
body. No two lodges, with one exception, 
were painted alike. On many of them, perhaps 
most, was painted, close up to the smoke-hole 
and at the rear, a symbol shaped much like 
a Maltese cross. I determined to ask Antoine 
what all the paintings signified. 

From this camp I went on up the river to 

27 



Rising Wolf 

the others, those of the Sik-si-kah, or Black- 
feet proper, and the Kai-na, or Bloods; these 
two and the Pi-kun-i comprising the three 
tribes of the Blackfoot Nation. And beyond 
them I looked down from the edge of the plain 
at the big camp of the Ut-se-na, or Gros Ventres, 
and last, that of the Sak-sis, or Heavy Talkers, 
a small Athabaskan tribe which had long been 
under the protection of the Blackfeet, as I 
learned later. 

That evening I asked Antoine many questions 
about what I had seen, only to find that he 
could not answer them. Nor could any of 
the employees. * Through the open doorway 
between the cook-room and his quarters the 
factor heard my futile questioning and called 
to me. I went in. He had me close the door, 
and then asked me a question that made me 
gasp. 



CHAPTER II 

THE SUN-GLASS 

HOW would you like to travel about with 
the Pi-kun-i for a time, and learn their 
language ? " 

I could only stare at him, hardly believing 
my ears, and he added: **I am sure that you 
would be in no more danger than you are here 
in the fort, or I would not propose this." 

**I would rather do it than anything else! 
It is just what I want to do!" I told him. 

"Let me explain the situation to you fully," 
he went on. "But, first, did you ever hear of 
Lewis and Clark ? 

"No? Well, they are two American Army 
officers who, a few years ago, led an expedition 
from the Mississippi River up the Missouri 
River to its head in the Rocky Mountains, 
and thence down the waters of the Oregon to 
its confluence with the Pacific Ocean. They 

29 



Rising Wolf 

were the first white men ever to see the country 
at the headwaters of the Missouri, and between 
it and the ocean. Now, in the dispatches that 
came to me with the goods, yesterday, I re- 
ceived most disturbing news: Following the 
trail of Lewis and Clark, our rival, the Ameri- 
can Fur Company, is pushing westward and 
establishing posts on the Missouri, the upper 
part of which is in our own territory. I am 
ordered to learn if it has entered our territory, 
and if so, to take steps to block its trade with 
our Blackfoot tribes. The Pi-kun-i are going 
south to the Missouri plains for the summer as 
soon as they finish their trade with us, and I 
want you to go with them, and, while learning 
their language, keep an eye out for our rivals. 
I can't trust Antoine to do this, and anyhow 
he will never become a good interpreter. I be- 
lieve that you will soon master the language." 

Of course the factor was mistaken. The 
Missouri River country was not in our terri- 
tory. We were to learn that later. Nor did 

30 



The Sun-Glass 

we then have any idea of the vast extent of 
the hunting-ground of the Blackfeet. It was 
for me to discover that it extended from the 
Saskatchewan, yes, even from the Slave Lakes, 
south to their Elk River of the South, which 
is the Yellowstone River of the whites, and 
from the Rocky Mountains eastward for an 
average width of more than three hundred 
miles. A part of it, from the tributaries of 
the Missouri south, had been Crow country, 
but the Blackfeet had driven them from it. 
The Pi-kun-i, with their allies, the Ut-se-na, 
or Gros Ventres, lived for the greater part 
of the time in the southern part of it, along 
the Missouri and its northern and southern 
tributaries, and the other two tribes, with their 
Athabaskans, the Sak-sis, liked best the plains 
of the Saskatchewan and its tributaries. 

Before the advent of the horse the Blackfeet 
tribes had all lived in the Slave Lake country. 
The Crees had so named these great bodies 
of water, for the reason that in that far-away 

31 



Rising Wolf 

time the Blackfeet made slaves of the enemies 
they captured. As nearly as I could learn, it 
was between 1680 and 1700 when the Black- 
feet began to obtain horses by raids far to the 
south, even to Old Mexico, and in 1741 or 1742 
obtained a few guns from the post on the As- 
siniboine River founded by the Sieur de la Ve- 
rendrie, that unfortunate explorer who was 
the first white man to see the Rocky, or as he 
named them, the Shining, Mountains. With 
both guns and horses, the Blackfeet were not 
long in taking possession of the rich game 
country to the south of the Slave Lakes, and 
driving from it not only the Crows, but other 
tribes as well. 

On the day after my talk with the factor, 
he had an interview with Lone Walker, head 
chief of the Pi-kun-i, to which I was an in- 
terested listener. It was agreed, as well as 
Antoine could explain the matter, that I was 
to travel south in his care, living in his lodge, 
and riding his horses, and that upon bringing 

32 



The Sun-Glass 

me safe back to the fort when he and his tribes 
returned to trade, he should be given a gun, 
two blankets, and two lengths of twist tobacco. 
Rich presents, indeed! More than enough, as 
the factor said, to insure his taking the greatest 
care of me. And anyhow my heart went out 
to the chief. Tall, dignified in bearing, his 
handsome face and eyes expressive of a kind 
and honest nature, I felt from the start that 
he would be a good friend to me, and I was 
not mistaken. I little realized at that time, 
however, what a really great man he was with 
his people. 

Owing to their desire to start south at once, 
the Pi-kun-i were the first to trade in their 
take of furs. They were a matter of ten or twelve 
days doing it, and in the meantime I kept pretty 
close in the trade-room listening to Antoine's 
interpretations of their needs, and memorizing 
the words. In that way I learned their names 
for the different trade articles, and a few helpful 
sentences as well, such as the equivalent in their 

33 



Rising Wolf 

language for "What is it?" "Where is it?" 
" What is it named ? " and so on. And then, one 
day, I saw Antoine's wife sitting with a Sak-si 
woman, the two apparently conversing with one 
another by means of signs. I asked Antoine 
about it and learned that it was the sign lan- 
guage, used by all the tribes of the plains; that 
almost anything could be told by it, even stories, 
and that his wife understood it very well. 

" Then why don't you learn it ? Would it not 
be of great help in your interpreting? " the factor 
asked him. 

"I am try! I am do my possible! Sare, 
honneur, my ban's, my fingare, he is not queek 
to do it!" he answered. 

"Huh! Antoine, you're a fool! Yes, and so 
am I, or I would have known about this sign 
language, and have learned it long since!" the 
factor exclaimed. 

"My woman, she will teach it to you; I will 
help," Antoine volunteered. 

We began lessons with her that very evening, 
34 



The Sun-Glass 

and before I left I had pretty well learned it. 
The signs are invariably so significant of the 
thought to be expressed, that, once seen and 
understood, they are not easily forgotten. I 
know not where the sign language originated, 
but I think that it came to the people of the 
plains from Mexico, spreading from one tribe to 
another until it finally reached the Blackfeet. 
The tribes of the forests, and of the two coasts, 
and the Great Lakes, knew it not. 

At last the morning came upon which the 
Pi-kun-i were to break camp. On the evening 
before Lone Walker had sent my outfit of things 
over to his lodge, ready to be put upon one of his 
pack horses, and now, leading a horse for me, he 
came to the fort with his under-chiefs for a fare- 
well meal and smoke with the factor. 

I hastily ate my morning meat and, while the 
smoking was going on, saddled and bridled the 
horse. The factor had given me his own light, 
English, hunting-saddle, and I thought it a very 
comfortable one to ride upon. Later, when I got 

35 



Rising Wolf 

from a warrior a Spanish saddle that he had taken 
in a raid far to the south, I learned what comfort 
in riding really was I 

The horse saddled, I said good-bye to the 
men. The voyageurs with whom I had come to 
the fort were soon to load the boats with furs 
and return to York Factory, and eventually 
Montreal, and I handed the head man a letter 
for my mother, telling her of my safe arrival at 
the fort, of the thousands of wild Indians that I 
had seen, and the expedition upon which I was 
about to embark. If all went well, she would 
receive it in about a year's time. 

The round of smoking ended, the chiefs came 
out with the factor, and I said a last good-bye to 
him, and we mounted and set forth. 

There were just twenty-four of the chiefs, one 
for each band, or gens, of the Pi-kun-i — Lone 
Walker, as I afterward learned, being chief of the 
I-nuk-siks, or Small Robes Band, as well as head 
chief of the tribe. With them were five other 
men, ^ach wearing his hair done into a huge, fur- 

36 



The Sun-Glass 

bound knot on the foretop of his head, the in- 
signia of the sun priest, or so-called medicine 
man. None of the party wore war bonnets, or 
war costumes, and that rather surprised me. I 
soon learned that they were never worn except 
when the men were going into battle — if there 
was time to put them on, and when dancing, or 
observing some great religious ceremony. No! 
The decked-out Indian, hunting, or traveling, 
or sitting about in camp, and the Indian wearing 
nothing but a breech clout and a pair of mocca- 
sins, is just the Indian of the artists' dreams! 
My Indians wore plain leather shirts, and wide- 
flapped leggings, and quill-embroidered moc- 
casins, and their wraps were also of leather, some 
of them painted with pictographs of the wearer's 
adventures in war and hunting. 

But for all that they were picturesque enough. 
Each one carried a shield slung from the left 
arm, and bow and arrows in a case and quiver 
at the back, and a gun across the saddle front. 
Beautifully dyed quill embroidery on the fringed 

37 



Rising Wolf 

leather pipe and tobacco sacks dangling from 
their belts, and the bright, painted symbols on 
the covering of their shields gave the needed 
color to their otherwise somewhat soberly plain, 
everyday wear. 

And what splendidly built men they were! 
What fine features they had, and the small, per- 
fectly formed hands and feet of real gentlemen. 
And I learned that they had the manners of 
gentlemen. That in their daily intercourse they 
were ever courteous to one another. That their 
jesting and joking was never rude or coarse, and 
how they did love a good joke and laugh ! And 
proud they were, of their lineage, and their war 
records, and their women and children, of their 
great herds of horses, and their vast domain. 
But it was a just and natural pride, in no way 
different from the pride of our own best people. 
And with it was great kindliness of heart and 
ready proffers of help for all the unfortunate, for 
widows and orphans, the old and the sick. Such 
were the old-time Blackfoot chiefs. 

38 



The Sun-Glass 

Camp had been broken while the chiefs were 
saying their farewells in the fort, and now, as 
we rode out upon the plain from the river bottom, 
we saw the great caravan strung out away ahead 
of us and to our right. It was like a huge snake 
making its way southward over the ridges and 
the hollovv^s of the plain, a snake about three 
miles in length ! 

It was advancing at a slow trot, and at a 
livelier pace we rode along its length to take the 
lead. Each family had its place in it, the women 
and children riding pack and travois horses, 
the men and youths driving the loose ones. 
The trappings of the horses, broad leather 
breast bands and cruppers, blazed with color, 
beautifully worked designs of porcupine-quill 
embroidery. The quaintly shaped farfleches, 
fringed pouches and sacks of rawhide and 
leather, upon the pack horses were brightly 
painted. Some horses, generally white ones 
daubed with red ochre, the sacred color, carried 
nothing but the pipe and pouches of a medicine 

39 



Rising Wolf 

man, and were always led. The lodge-pole 
horses dragged, generally, four lodge poles, two 
fastened to each side of the saddle by the small 
ends, and these and the ends of the travois poles 
scraped harshly into the plain and wore deeper 
than ever the many furrows of the broad trail. 

As I rode with the chiefs along the edge of the 
long column I believe that every man, woman, 
and child of it gave me a smile, and some sort of 
greeting — one of which, **Ok-yi, nap-i-an-i- 
kap-i!'' (Welcome, white youth), I already 
knew. And to all I replied : *'Ok-yi, ni-tuk-a!" 
(Welcome, friend), which was a sad error when 
addressed to a woman or girl, embarrassing them, 
and causing all who heard to laugh. But the 
greetings and the smiles gave me heart; I felt 
that I was already liked by these people of the 
plains, and that was pleasant. I certainly liked 
them. 

We passed the long column and rode on 
ahead of it, but not in the real lead. Ahead of 
us several hundred men, the scouts for the day, 

40 



The Sun-Glass 

rode spread out like a great fan far to the right 
and left of the trail, as well as some of them upon 
it. They were not hunting; time and again we 
saw herds of buffaloes and antelopes rushing off 
out of their way, and none pursued them. 

It was about noon when, 'topping a low ridge, 
Lone Walker led us a little to one side of the 
trail and dismounted. So did we all, tethering 
our horses to bunches of sage or greasewood, and 
then sitting in a little circle on the top of the rise. 
A medicine man unfastened the fringed and 
embroidered sack dangling at his belt and, get- 
ting out pipe and tobacco and some dried leaves 
of rherb to mix with the tobacco, made leisurely 
but careful preparations for a smoke. First he 
thoroughly cleaned the huge, black, stone bowl, 
blowing through it, and then the separate, long, 
carved wooden stem, to make sure that they 
were clear. Then he fitted them together, and 
little by little filled the bowl with the mixture of 
tobacco and Vherh, tamping down each pinch 
with a small, blunt-ended stick. This done to his 

41 



Rising Wolf 

entire satisfaction, he unslung from his shoulder 
a section from a birch tree, about four inches in 
diameter and six inches in length, removed its 
wooden stopper, and I saw that it was hollowed 
out, and clay lined. Turning the mouth of the 
strange receptacle to the ground, he gave it a rap 
or two and out came a piece of partly charred 
punk wood which he quickly picked up and blew 
upon, and I realized that this was the Blackfoot 
way of keeping fire. But, blow as he would, 
there came no glow in the punk, no rise of smoke. 
The fire was out. 

H With an exclamation of disappointment the 
man dropped the punk back into place, put in 
the stopper, meantime looking around the circle 
to see if any one carried one of these fire boxes, 
as I may call them. None did. Here and there 
a man spoke, evidently remarking upon his 
disappointment. And then, suddenly, I thought 
of my grandfather's present to me, the sun-glass 
in the pouch at my side, and I called out to the 
medicineman: *' I will light it for you!" In my 

42 



The Sun-Glass 

excitement I forgot that he knew no word of my 
language. 

But I had called his attention to me, and that 
of all the others too. They watched me closely 
as I fumbled in the pouch for the glass, drew it 
out and removed its silk wrapping. Having 
done that, I made signs to the medicine man to 
put the stem of the pipe to his mouth. He did 
so, and I focused the glass upon the charge of the 
tobacco mixture in the bowl. Almost at once it 
began to turn black and a thin streak of smoke 
to rise from it, and, drawing steadily upon the 
stem, the medicine man filled his mouth with 
smoke, his eyes growing bigger and bigger, until 
at last he let out a great blow of it, and then, 
with a shout of surprise, sprang to his feet and 
held the pipe aloft toward the sun. At that all 
the other chiefs sprang up, and shouting I knew 
not what, made a rush for me, and I believed my 
time had come! 

Antoine had told me that the Blackfeet — as 
he called them, the heathen Blackfeet — wor- 

43 



Rising Wolf 

shiped the sun. The thought flashed through 
my mind that I was to be killed for using the 
sacred fire of their god! And as wild-eyed, 
excited, shouting chiefs came crowding around 
me I threw up my hands, in one of them the 
fateful glass, and cried: "I did not mean harm! 
It is a glass, nothing but a glass!" 

As though they could understand! Or my 
pitiful cry save me ! 

But suddenly, instead of blows I saw that 
Lone Walker and others nearest me were strok- 
ing my shoulders, my breast, and back with their 
open hands, and then their own bodies, and the 
others, crowding, reached in between them and 
touched me wherever they could, and then 
stroked themselves, meantime shouting some- 
thing to the head of the passing caravan. 

Out from it rushed all who heard, men and 
women, and sprang from their horses and surged 
in to me, women frantically edging in under the 
arms of the men and rubbing their suckling 
infants against any part of my body that they 

44 



The Sun-Glass 

could reach. And still badly frightened, I thrust 
the glass into Lone Walker's hand and made 
signs the best I could that I gave it to him. 
With a shout he held it aloft, tears streaming 
from his eyes, and began what I sensed must be 
a prayer to the sun. At that a great hush came 
upon the ever-increasing crowd. All listened 
closely, occasionally crying out something that 
I afterward learned was as we would say: "Yes! 
Yes! Have pity upon us all, O sun!" Then, 
presently, he finished the prayer, and looking 
around at the people addressed a few words to 
them. Whereupon they mounted and resumed 
their places in the column, and moved on. 

The chiefs, however, again sat down in a 
circle, Lone Walker signing to me to sit beside 
him, and the pipe was passed from hand to hand, 
each one in turn taking a few whiffs of smoke 
from it and blowing it first toward the sun, and 
then to the ground. At last the pipe came to 
me. I passed it on to the chief on my right, but 
he instantly handed it back and gave me to 

45 



Rising Wolf 

understand that I was to smoke. I did so, blow- 
ing the smoke to sky and earth as I had seen the 
others do, and then passed it on. I had never 
smoked. The taste of it was bitter and nauseat- 
ing in my mouth ; my head soon began to swim 
and I felt terribly sick for a long time. I did not 
smoke again until I was past my twenty-fifth 
birthday. 

Well, when the pipe was smoked out and put 
away we mounted our horses and rode on, I still 
sick but quite over my scare. Word of what I 
had done, of my bringing down sun fire, had 
evidently passed back the entire length of the 
column, for as I rode on to the head of it with 
the chiefs the people all called out to me again, 
and this time with a new name for me, and in 
their manner respect, even awe, was evident 
enough. They called me now, "Nat-o-wap- 
an-i-kap-i," which I thought had to do with the 
sun (nat-os). I was right; I soon learned that 
the word meant sun youth, or sacred youth. 
I was very proud of the name, and very glad of 

46 



The Sun-Glass 

my grandfather's happy thought in selecting the 
glass for me. True, I had brought it this long 
way across the plains only to part with it, but my 
one chance use of it had given me important 
standing with the tribe. 

We traveled on steadily ahead of the column 
until about four o'clock in the afternoon, and 
then once more dismounted and gathered in a 
circle, this time on the edge of a long slope run- 
ning down to the timbered valley of a small 
stream. Again the medicine man got out his 
pipe and filled it, and I taught Lone Walker how 
to light the charge with the sun-glass, every one 
intently watching, and making exclamations of 
wonder and satisfaction when the feat was ac- 
complished. This time I firmly passed the pipe 
when it came to me, and while the chiefs smoked 
and chatted I watched the long procession of the 
tribe pass down the slope into the valley, and 
scatter out over a big, grassy flat on the far side 
of the creek. There the horses were relieved of 
their burdens, and a few minutes later every 

47 



Rising Wolf 

lodge of the camp was up in place, and the women 
were carrying into them their various family 
belongings, and going for wood and water. All 
that was the women's work; the men sat about 
until all was completed. 

As soon as the pipe was smoked out we got 
upon our horses and rode slowly down the slope 
to the creek, and then scattered out into camp. 
Lone Walker led me to the southwest part of the 
big circle of lodges, which was the allotted place 
for his band, the Small Robes, and to one of two 
immense lodges, which were both his property. 

We got down from our horses, and I was about 
to unsaddle mine, when a woman took him from 
me, and signed that I was to follow the chief into 
the lodge. I did so, and, making a step in 
through the doorway, heard a growling and 
snorting that made my heart jump. And well it 
might, for there on each side of me, reared back 
and hair all bristled up, was a half-grown grizzly 
bear! 

48 



The Sun-Glass 

I dared not move, neither to retreat, nor go 
forward, and thus I stood for what seemed 
to me hours of time, and then Lone Walker 
scolded the bears and they dropped down at rest 
and I passed them and went to the place pointed 
out to me, the comfortable couch on the left of 
the chief's. 

I think that the chief allowed me to stand so 
long facing the bears, just to try me; to learn if I 
had any nerve. I was glad that I had not cried 
out or fled. I soon became friendly with those 
bears, and often played with them. It has been 
said that grizzlies cannot be tamed. Those two 
were tame. They had been captured when small 
cubs, so small that they made no resistance to 
being taken up, and for months had been held 
up to the teats of mares, there to get the milk 
without which they could not have lived. I may 
say here that they disappeared one night in the 
spring of their third year, and were never seen 
again. They had at last answered the call of 
their kind. 

49 



Rising Wolf 

It was with intense interest that I looked 
about the lodge, the first that I had ever entered, 
and which was to be my home for I knew not 
how many months. 

It was a lodge of twenty-eight buffalo cow 
skins, tanned into soft leather, trimmed to 
proper shape to fit together, and sewed with 
strong sinew thread. It was all of twenty-four 
feet in diameter, and the lodge poles were at least 
thirty-six feet long, and so heavy that a horse 
dragged but two of them. There were thirty 
poles, and the lodge skin was in two sections. 
All around the inside was a leather lining running 
from the ground up to a height of about six feet, 
and attached to a rawhide line running from pole 
to pole. This made an air space between the 
lodge skin and the lining of the thickness of the 
poles. The pegged lodge skin did not reach the 
ground by four inches or more, so the air rushed 
in under it, and up between it and the lining, and 
out of the top of the lodge. This created a good 
draught for the fire and carried off the smoke. 

SO 



The Sun-Glass 

No air came in through or under the lining, it 
reflected the heat of the fire, and because of this 
simple construction the lodge was warm and 
comfortable even in the coldest winter weather. 
The lining was brightly painted, the design be- 
ing a series of three different long, narrow, geo- 
metric figures distinctively Blackfoot. 

All around the lodge, excepting on each side 
of the doorway, were the couches of the occu- 
pants, ten in number, a slanting back-rest of 
willow slats at the head and foot of each one. 
In the triangular spaces thus left between the 
couches, and on each side of the doorway, were 
stored no end of parflecheSy bags, pouches, and 
leather-wrapped bundles containing the property 
of the different occupants of the lodge. Besides 
Lone Walker and myself, there were eight women 
and nine children, ranging from babies up to 
boys and girls twelve and fourteen and eighteen 
years old, the latter being a boy named I-sas-to, 
or Red Crow, whose couch and sitting-place I was 
to share. 

51 



Rising Wolf 

Be not shocked or surprised when I tell you 
that Lone Walker had nineteen wives. Eight 
were in this lodge. The others and their chil- 
dren, and the chiefs old father and mother were 
in the adjoining, big, twenty-eight-skin lodge. 
At first this polygamy was very repugnant to me ; 
but I soon saw how necessary it was. The 
Blackfeet men were continually falling in battle 
with their many enemies, and only by becoming 
plural wives could the large preponderance of 
women be cared for. 

Lone Walker's first, or head wife, named 
Sis-tsi-ah-ki, or Little Bird Woman, was a fine- 
looking woman of about thirty-five years. She 
was one of the happiest persons I have known. 
There was always a smile on her face, she sang 
constantly at her work, and her heart was as 
good as her smile; she was always doing some- 
thing nice for others. In a way she was the head, 
or supervisor of the other wives, apportioning to 
each the work that was for the family. But each 
woman had her own private property, including 

52 



The Sun-Glass 

horses, and her share of the meat and hides 
brought in. 

There was a big gathering in our lodge that 
night, men constantly coming in to see the won- 
derful instrument that could bring down sun fire. 
It was late when we got to rest. The fire died 
down. Like the others, I disrobed under the 
coverings of my couch, and then I went to sleep 
with never a thought of fear, I, a lone white boy, 
in a camp of about nine thousand wild Indians! 

Lone Walker aroused us soon after daylight 
the next morning and had me go with him and all 
his male children to bathe in the stream. Winter 
and summer the Blackfeet never neglected that 
daily bath, although sometimes they had to go 
out and rub themselves with snow, because there 
was nowhere open water. In winter the women 
and girls took their baths in sweat lodges. 

After the bath we had an early meal of dried 
meat, roasted before the fire, and small portions 
of rich, dried buffalo back fat, which was used 
as the whites use butter. 

S3 



Rising Wolf 

While we were eating, Lone Walker gave me 
to understand that his two lodges were needing 
fresh meat, and that with his son I could go on 
ahead of the moving camp and kill some. That 
pleased me; it was just what I was longing to do. 
You can imagine how much more pleased I was 
when the great herd of the chief's horses were 
brought in, and, saying, ''You gave me your 
fire instrument, I now give you something," 
he selected ten good horses in the herd and said 
that they were all mine. How rich I felt ! 

Long before the lodges came down Red Crow 
and I were riding out along the great south trail. 
As we topped the slope of the valley and I looked 
out upon the immense plain ahead, and at the 
snow-covered peaks of the great mountains 
bordering it on the west, I said to myself, that 
this was the happiest day of my life, for I, Hugh 
Monroe, just a boy, was entering a great section 
of the country that white men had never trav- 
ersed ! 

And, oh, how keen I was to see it all — its plains 
54 



The Sun-Glass 

and stream valleys, its tremendous mountains, 
its pine-crowned, flat-topped sentinel buttes! 
Mine was to be the honor of learning their Black- 
feet names, and translating them for the map 
our company was to make for the use of its men. 
Also, I looked forward with great desire for 
the adventures which I felt sure I was to have 
in that unknown land. Had I known what some 
of them were to be, I would perhaps have turned 
right then and made my way back to the safety 
of the fort. 



CHAPTER III 

HUNTING WITH RED CROW 

WHEN we rode out upon the plain from the 
valley on our way from the Post we saw 
several bands of buffaloes away off to the right 
and left of the trail. Red Crow paid no atten- 
tion to them, and when, at last, I gave him 
to understand by signs that I would like to ap- 
proach the nearest band, a couple of miles ahead 
and perhaps that far from the trail, he answered 
that we must do our killing on, or close to, the 
trail so that the women could put the meat on the 
pack horses when they came along. 

In my hunting back in the forest at home I had 
learned the value of the saying about the bird in 
hand, and I thought that we should go after that 
nearest herd because we might not see another 
so close to the trail during the day. But I need 
not have worried; before the day was over I 
learned that the game of the plains was as ten 

S6 



Hunting with Red Grow 

thousand to one of the game of the Eastern 
forest. 

We rode on perhaps three miles farther, and 
then, topping one of the many low ridges of the 
plain, saw an immense herd of buffaloes grazing on 
the next ridge, and right on the trail. They were 
slowly moving south, and we waited a long time 
for the last stragglers of the herd to pass over 
the ridge and out of sight, and then rode on at an 
easy lope. As we neared the top of the ridge 
Red Crow drew his bow from the case and quiver 
at his back, and then drew out four arrows, three 
of which he held crosswise in his mouth, fitting 
the fourth to the bow. I looked into the pan of 
my gun and made sure that it was full of powder. 
And then my heart began to beat fast ; I was soon 
to have my first shot at a buffalo ! I said to my- 
self: *'I must be careful to take good aim! I 
will not — will not get excited!" 

I thought that when near the top of the ridge 
we would dismount, go on a few steps and cau- 
tiously rise up and shoot at the nearest of the 

57 



Rising Wolf 

buffaloes.' But Red Crow never slackened the 
speed of his horse and I was obliged to follow his 
lead. Upon reaching the ridge top we saw the 
great herd resting close under us on the slope, 
some lying down, others apparently asleep where 
they stood. But they saw us as soon as we saw 
them, and away they went, we after them as fast 
as our eager horses could run. 

I had never thought that a horse could be so 
keen for the chase. Mine just took the bit in his 
teeth and carried me where he willed. We were 
soon right at the edge of the frightened herd. I 
saw Red Crow, some thirty or forty yards ahead 
of me, ride close up to the right side of an animal 
and fire an arrow into it, just back of the ribs, 
and go on without giving it further attention. 
And then I realized that my horse had brought 
me close to one of the huge, shaggy-headed, sharp- 
horned animals, and I poked my gun out and 
fired, and saw blood almost instantly begin to 
gush from its nostrils. It made a few more leaps 
and stopped and fell, and I tried to stop my 

S8 



Hunting with Red Grow 

horse beside it as I shouted, **I have killed a 
buffalo ! I have killed a buffalo ! " 

But I could not check up the horse, or even 
turn him, try as I would; a few jumps more and 
he had me up beside another animal. Then I 
wished that my pistols were in my belt, instead of 
in my traveling-kit. I poured a charge of powder 
from the horn into my hand, but spilled it all 
before I could get it to the muzzle of my gun. 
I tried again with the same result. I was not 
used to loading a gun when riding a horse at its 
top speed. I gave up the attempt and watched 
Red Crow, still ahead, and the huge animals 
thundering along on either side of me. Clumsily 
built though they were, with deep chest, high 
hump on the shoulders, and cat hammed, they 
were far swifter runners than any horse, except 
for the first few hundred yards of the start. The 
horse soon tired; they could keep up their killing 
pace for hours, when frightened. After a half- 
mile of the chase Red Crow dropped out of it, 
and I managed to turn my horse with his and 

59 



Rising Wolf 

Start back over the ground that we had come. 
Ahead of us lay three dead buffaloes, and quite 
near one was standing humped up, head down, 
badly wounded. It suddenly dropped and was 
dead when we rode up to it. I rode on to the one 
I had killed, eager to examine it, and Red Crow 
followed me. As we approached it he laughed 
and gave me to understand that it was an old 
bull, and therefore no good, its meat too tough 
to eat, and he pointed to his three, two young 
cows and a yearling bull, as good, fat meat. 

I felt sorry that I had uselessly killed the huge 
animal. I got down from my horse and examined 
it. Its massive, sharp-horned, shaggy, and be- 
whiskered head ; its long knee hair, encircling the 
legs like pantalettes, and the great hump on its 
shoulders were all very odd. In order to get some 
idea of its height I lay down on its side, my feet 
even with its fore feet. Then I reached up and 
found that I could nowhere near touch the top 
of its hump. It was between six and seven feet 
in height ! 

60 



Hunting with Red Grow 

"One part of it is good," Red Crow signed to 
me, and got off his horse and skinned down the 
bull's lower jaw, and pulled out and back the 
tongue through the opening, cut it off at the base, 
and handed it to me. I had it that night for my 
supper, well roasted over the coals, and thought 
it the best meat I had ever tasted. 

I had been wondering how, with nothing but a 
knife, the hunters managed to butcher such large 
animals as the buffaloes were. Red Crow now 
showed me how it was done. We went to the 
first of his kills, and after withdrawing the arrow, 
wiping it clean with a wisp of grass, and replacing 
it ' in the quiver, he twisted the cow's head 
sharply around beside the body, the horns stick- 
ing into the ground holding it in place. He then 
grasped the under foreleg by the ankle, and using 
it as a lever gave a quick heave. Lo, the great 
body rolled up on its back and remained there 
propped against the sideways turned head! It 
was simple enough. He now cut the hide from 
tail to neck along the belly, and from that in- 

6i 



Rising Wolf 

cision down each leg, and then, I helping in the 
skinning, we soon had the bare carcass lying upon 
its spread-out hide. Then off came the legs, next 
the carcass was turned upon its side, an incision 
was made all along the base of the hump, and it 
was broken off by hammering the ends of the 
hump, or dorsal ribs, with a joint of a leg cut off 
at the knee. Lastly, with a knife and the blows of 
the leg joint, the ribs were taken off in two sec- 
tions, and nothing remained upon the hide but a 
portion of the backbone and the entrails. These 
we rolled off the hide and the job was done, 
except tying the portions two by two with 
strands of the hide, so that they would balance 
one another on the pack horse. 

We had all three animals butchered before 
the moving camp came up. Then Lone Walker's 
outfit left the line and came out to us, his head 
wife supervised the packing of the meat, and we 
were soon on our way again. 

I had had my first buffalo hunt. But I did 
not know that the buffaloes were to be my staff of 

62 



Hunting with Red Grow 

life, my food, my shelter, and my clothing, so to 
speak, for nearly seventy years, until, in fact, 
they were to be exterminated in the early eighties ! 

Late in the afternoon of our seventh day out 
from the fort we went into camp at the junction 
of two beautiful, clear mountain streams, as I 
afterward learned, the Belly River, and Old 
Man's River* The former was so named on 
account of the broad bend it makes in its course, 
and the latter because it is believed that Old 
Man, when making the world, tarried long in the 
mountains at its head and gambled with Red Old 
Man, another god. On a mountain-side there is 
still to be seen a long, smooth furrow in the rock 
formation, and at the foot of it several huge 
stone balls which the gods rolled along it at the 
goal. 

The timber along these streams was alive with 
deer and elk, and from the plains countless herds 
of buffaloes and antelopes came swarming to them 
morning and evening to drink. The chiefs de- 
creed that we should camp there for some days 

63 



Rising Wolf 

for hunting and drying meat, and with Red 
Crow for my companion I had great sport, killing 
several of each kind of game. We would ride 
out in the morning, followed by Red Crow's 
sister, Su-yi-kai-yi-ah-ki, or Mink Woman, riding 
a gentle horse and leading a couple of pack horses 
for bringing in the meat. Of course hundreds of 
hunters went out each day, but by picketing each 
evening the horses we were to use next day, and 
starting very early in the morning, we got a long 
start of most of them and generally had all the 
meat we could pack before noon. 

We killed buffaloes mostly, for that was the 
staple meat, meat that one never tired of eating. 
Antelope, deer, and elk meat was good fresh, for 
a change, but it did not dry well. As fast as we 
got the buffalo meat home, Sis-tsi-ah-ki divided 
it equally in quality and amount among the 
wives, and they cut it into very thin sheets, and 
hung it in the sun, and in about two days' time 
it dried out, and was then packed for transpor- 
tation in parflecheSy large rawhide receptacles 

64 



Hunting with Red Grow 

shaped like an envelope, the flaps laced to- 
gether. 

Su-yi-kai-yi-ah-ki was of great help to us in 
our hunting. We often sent her into the timber, 
or around behind a ridge, or up a coulee to drive 
game to us, and she seldom failed to do it. She 
was also an expert wielder of the knife, able to 
skin an animal as quickly as either of us. She was 
about my age, and tall and slender, quick in all 
her actions, and very beautiful. Her especial 
pride was her hair, which she always kept neatly 
done into two long braids. The ends of them 
almost touched the ground when she stood up 
straight. Best of all, she had the same kind 
heart and happy disposition as her mother, 
Sis-tsi-ah-ki. 

Let me say here that a woman's or girl's name 
always terminated in " ah-ki," the term for wo- 
man. For instance, if a man was named after a 
bear, he would be called Kyai-yo. If a woman 
was so named, she would be Kyai-yo-ah-ki 
(Bear Woman). 

6s 



Rising Wolf 

From the junction of Belly River and Old 
Man's River, we trailed southwest across the 
plain to a large stream that I was told was 
named Ahk-ai-nus-kwo-na-e-tuk-tai (Gathering- 
of-Many-Chiefs River), for the reason that in 
years gone by the chiefs of the Blackfeet tribes 
had there met the chiefs of tribes living on the 
west side of the mountains, and concluded a 
peace treaty with them, which, however, lasted 
only two summers. We camped beside the river 
that evening, and the next day, following it up in 
its deep, wide valley, came to the shore of a large 
lake from which it ran, and there made camp. 
Never had I seen so beautiful a lake, or water so 
clear, and I said so as well as I could in signs and 
my small knowledge of the language I was trying 
so hard to learn. 

''It is beautiful," Red Crow told me, ''but 
wait until to-morrow; I will then show you a lake 
far larger and more beautiful. 

"We call these the Lakes Inside," he went on. 
*'See, this lake lies partly within the mountains. 

66 



Hunting with Red Grow 

The one above is wholly within them. But you 
shall see it all to-morrow." 

Over and over I repeated the name for them: 
Puhkt-o-muk-si-kim-iks (Lakes Inside), until 
sure that I would not forget it. Now they are 
known as St. Mary's Lakes. 

The morning after we camped at the foot of 
the lake, Red Crow, his sister, Mink Woman, 
and I were riding up the east side of the lake soon 
after daylight, and before any of the hunters 
were ready to start out. We followed a heavy 
game trail through quaking aspen groves and 
across little open, grassy parks, the still water of 
the lake always in view on our right, and across it 
the dark, timbered slope running up to a flat- 
topped mountain ending in an abrupt cliff hun- 
dreds of feet in height. We passed a beautiful 
island close in to our shore, and saw a small band 
of elk crossing a grassy opening in its heavy tim- 
ber. Elk and deer, and now and then a few buf- 
faloes, were continually getting out of our way, 
and once I got a glimpse of a big bull moose as 

67 



Rising Wolf 

it trotted into a willow thicket, and learned its 
name from Red Crow's exclamation, "Siks-tsi- 
80 !" But I did not know for some time that the 
word means " black-going-out-of-sight." A most 
appropriate name for the shy animal, for gener- 
ally that is about all that the hunter sees of it, 
its dark hind quarters disappearing in the thick 
cover it inhabits. 

Passing the head of the lower lake, we crossed 
a half-mile wide prairie and came to the foot of 
the upper lake, long, narrow, and running back 
between mountains rising steeply to great height 
from the water's edge. I have traveled far; from 
the St. Lawrence to Hudson's Bay, and from it to 
the Rockies, and along them south to the Great 
Salt Lake, but nowhere have I seen anything to 
equal the beauty of that lake, and the grandeur of 
its surrounding mountains. I fell in love with 
the place right then. Red Crow was anxious 
to go on, but I made him wait until I gazed and 
gazed at the wonderful scene before me. It was 
all so beautiful, and yet so stern, that it hurt. 

68 



Hunting with Red Grow 

Grim, cold, defiant were the rocky heights of the 
mountains, and blue-black the water of the lake 
because of its great depth; but for all that I was 
fascinated by it all. I felt that I would like to 
camp there a long, long time and climb all those 
tremendous heights, and explore the whole of 
the great valley. 

"Come!" Red Crow called out at last, and we 
rode on, crossing the river on a good ford not 
far below the foot of the lake, and then following 
another big-game trail through more groves and 
parks along the west side of the lake. Even here, 
away back from the plains, were several herds of 
buffaloes, and more deer and elk trotting and run- 
ning from our near approach. I was more than 
once tempted to shoot at one of them, but Red 
Crow kept signing to me: "Wait! We will kill 
above here." 

At last we arrived at the foot of a long, rocky, 
and in most places wall-like ridge that ran from 
the mountains out across the valley and ended in 
a high cliff jutting out over the lake. We left 

69 



Rising Wolf 

our horses at the foot of it, followed a game trail 
up through a break in the wall and came out on 
the sparsely timbered, rounding top, grass-grown 
in places. Beyond, the lake, mountain walled, 
ran back several miles farther. Beyond it a nar- 
row and heavily timbered valley ran away back 
toward the summit of the range, where reposed 
long, high belts of what I thought was snow, but 
later learned was glacial ice, leavings of Cold 
Maker, the Pi-kun-i say, and his sign that, 
though the sun has driven him back into the Far 
North, he will come again with his winds and 
snows. 

We went on a few paces and Red Crow sud- 
denly stopped and pointed to some moving 
white figures high up on the steep side of a red- 
rocked mountain ahead and to our right. He 
made the sign for them: one's forefingers sloping 
upward and backward from each side of the head 
above the ears, and by that I knew that they 
had slender, backward curved horns. *'Ai-po- 
muk-a-kin-a," he called them, meaning " white- 

70 



Hunting with Red Crow 

big-heads." I had seen a few skins of the animals 
at the fort, and the factor had told me that they 
were those of the Rocky Mountain ibex. 

"We will go up and kill some of them!" Red 
Crow said, and we began a climb that lasted for 
hours. It was my first real mountain climb and I 
liked it even though I did shiver and sometimes 
feel faint, when we made our way along the edge 
of cliffs where a slip of the foot would mean the 
end for us. We climbed almost straight up and 
down watercourses ; over steep ridges ; and then 
from one rocky, timbered shelf to another, and 
at last approached the place where we had last 
seen the animals. Red Crow signed us to be 
cautious, and with ready bow and arrows led the 
way across a wide rock shelf, I close at his heels 
with my gun well primed and cocked, and right 
at my shoulder his sister, just as eager to see 
the game as we were. As we neared the edge of 
the shelf Red Crow motioned us to step up in 
line with him, and then we all very carefully 
looked down over it and saw the animals. 

71 



Rising Wolf 

But there was something going on with them 
that made Red Crow motion me to hold still. 
There were five, all big, white, long-haired males, 
and all standing at the edge of the shelf just 
under us, and looking intently at something 
below that we could not see. Their bodies were 
much the shape of the buffalo, high over the 
shoulders, low behind, and very deep chested; 
and they had long hair pantalettes at the knees, 
and a long beard. But their heads were very 
different; long, narrow, flat-faced. Foolish- 
faced, I thought. Their hair was more of a 
creamy color than white, and their horns, round, 
long, slender, curving back to a sharp point, 
were coal black, as were their eyes, nose, and 
hoofs. But strangest of all was the attitude of 
the one on the right of the row; he was sitting 
down on his haunches, just as a dog or cat sits, 
as he stared down, and such a position for a 
hoofed animal, a ruminant, was so odd, so funny, 
that 1 almost laughed aloud. 

We were not fifty feet above the ibexes, but so 
72 



Hunting with Red Grow 

intent were they upon what they were watching 
that they never looked up. Whatever it was, it 
seemed to be on the shelf of rock just below them 
and moving to the right, for the ibexes' heads 
kept turning steadily that way as they watched 
it. Then presently we saw what it was : another 
ibex. He came up on the shelf that they w^ere on, 
a very big, old male, and advanced toward them, 
and they all turned to face him, backs humped, 
hair bristling forward, heads lowered, and one 
advanced, trotting sideways, to meet him. He 
had also bristled up, and we thought that we were 
to see a big fight. They met, smelled one anoth- 
er's noses, and leaped into the air, coming down 
several feet apart, stood motionless for some 
time, and then the one that belonged to the band 
went back to his companions while another went 
forward and through the same performance with 
the newcomer. It was a very funny sight. 

But I was becoming anxious to shoot. I 
wanted one of the strange animals and was 
afraid that if we delayed firing they might be- 

73 



Rising Wolf 

come aware of us and suddenly take to flight. I 
nudged Red Crow and signed him to shoot, and 
as he raised his bow I aimed at the newcomer, 
biggest of them all. Twang, went the bow, and 
whoom, my gun ! My animal fell, as did the one 
Red Crow had chosen for his arrow, and both 
made faint attempts to regain their feet. The 
others did not run. Without doubt they had 
never heard the report of a gun before, and mis- 
took it for the dropping of a time-loosened rock 
from the heights above. They just stood and 
stared at their fallen companions, and I drew 
back from the edge of the shelf and began reload- 
ing my gun, while Red Crow continued firing 
arrow after arrow from the bunch he held in his 
left hand with the bow. I was not long getting 
the charge down and pouring priming into the 
pan, and then I advanced for another shot. 

Can you imagine my surprise when I found 
that I was too late? All the little band were 
down, dead and dying, and, as I looked, the last 
of them ceased struggling and lay still ! I stared 

74 



Hunting with Red Crow 

at them, at Red Crow and his bow, and at my 
gun. In many ways mine was the better weapon, 
but for running buffaloes, and other quick shoot- 
ing at short range, I saw that the bow was the 
thing to use. Right there I determined to get a 
bow outfit and learn to use it, and always to carry 
it on my back, and my gun in my hands. 

We found a place to get down from our shelf to 
the dead animals, and I carefully examined mine 
before skinning it. I found that it had a thick 
growth of short wool underneath its long, coarse 
hair, and after that never wondered at the ability 
of its kind to withstand cold. In winter, the 
more severe the weather and deep the snow, the 
higher they range on the mountains, seeking the 
bare rock which the fierce winds keep free from 
snow, for there grows their favorite food, moss, 
and several varieties of lichen. 

When I began skinning my kill I was struck 
by its peculiar odor, just like that of a musk- 
rat and a hundred times as strong. At the 
rear base of each horn I found a wart-like black 

75 



Rising Wolf 

gland filled with yellowish, greasy musk. When 
I finished skinning my animal I began on another, 
and we soon had them all skinned. I then took 
the boss, or dorsal ribs, of my kill and wrapped 
them in the two hides I was to carry, although 
Red Crow and his sister laughed at me, and gave 
me to understand that the meat was not good. 
I confess that I did not enjoy it. It was coarse 
and tough, and musky. However, a young, fat 
male or female of this high mountain species is 
good eating — when no other kind of meat is 
obtainable. 

While we were preparing to leave the shelf I 
saw my first bighorns, a band of ewes and young 
between us and the lake, and five big rams on the 
mountain-side to the south of us. We had no 
time to go after them, as the sun was getting low, 
and anyhow I was well satisfied with our success 
of the day. We hurried down the mountain to 
our horses and started on the long trail to camp. 
Whenever we crossed a park and looked out upon 
the lake we saw its calm surface broken by the 

76 



Hunting with Red Grow 

jumping of hundreds of fish, some of the splashes 
undoubtedly made by fish of great size. I after- 
ward found that they were the so-called Macki- 
naw trout, running in weight up to forty pounds. 
Besides them these lakes are full of cutthroat 
trout, and what the whites call Dolly Varden 
trout, and whitefish. 

The sun had set when we crossed the river and 
the big prairie at the foot of the upper lake, and 
started on the trail along the lower lake. It was 
almost dark when, hurrying along at a good lope, 
we crossed the park opposite the island, and en- 
tered a quaking aspen grove. And then, without 
warning. Red Crow's horse gave a sudden side- 
ways leap and threw him, and went snorting and 
tearing off to the right, and Mink Woman's and 
my horses took after him, plunging and kicking 
with fright, and try as we would we could not 
stop them. I saw the girl knocked from her 
horse by a projecting, low bough of a cottonwood 
tree. Behind us Red Crow was shouting *'Kyai-yo! 
Kyai-yo! Spom-ok-it!" (A bear! A bear! Help!) 

77 



Rising Wolf 

As I could not stop my horse I sprang off him, 
holding fast to my gun, passed Mink Woman 
struggling to her feet, and ran to assist my friend, 
his continued cries for help almost drowned by 
the terrible roars of an angry bear. Never had I 
heard anything so terrible. It struck fear to my 
heart. I wanted to turn and run from it, but I 
just could n't! And there close behind me came 
the girl, crying, *'Spom-os! Spom-os!" (Help 
him! Help him!) I just gritted my teeth and 
kept on. 



CHAPTER IV 

A FIGHT WITH THE RIVER PEOPLE 

I WENT but a little way through the brush 
when, in the dim light, I saw Red Crow 
clinging with both hands to a slender, swaying, 
quaking aspen, and jerking up his feet from the 
up-reaching swipes of a big bear's claws. He could 
find no lodgment for his feet and could climb no 
higher; as it was, the little tree threatened to 
snap in two at any moment. It was bending 
more and more to the right, and directly over 
the bear, and he was lifting his legs higher and 
higher. There was no time to be lost! Scared 
though I was, I raised my gun, took careful 
sight for a heart shot at the big animal, and 
pulled the trigger. Whoom ! And the bear gave 
a louder roar than ever, fell and clawed at its 
side, then rose and came after me, and as I turned 
to run I saw the little tree snap in two and Red 
Crow drop to the ground. 

79 



Rising Wolf 

I turned only to bump heavily into Mink 
Woman, and we fell, both yelling, and sprang up 
and ran for our lives, expecting that every jump 
would be our last. But we had gone only a short 
way when it struck me that we were not being 
pursued, and then, oh, how can I describe the 
relief I felt when I heard Red Crow shout to us : 
"Puk-si-put! Ahk-ai-ni!" (Come! He is dead!) 

Well, when I heard that my strength seemed 
suddenly to go from me, and I guess that the 
girl felt the same way. We turned back, hand 
in hand, wabbly on our legs, and gasping as 
we recovered our breath. Again and again Red 
Crow called to us, and at last I got enough wind 
into me to answer him, and he came to meet us, 
and led us back to the bear. 

I had not thought that a grizzly could be as 
big as it was. It lay there on its side as big 
bodied as a buffalo cow. The big mouth was 
open, exposing upper and lower yellow fangs as 
long as my forefinger. I lifted up one huge fore- 
foot and saw that the claws were four inches and 

80 



A Fight with the River People 

more in length. Lastly, I saw that there was an 
arrow deep in its breast. Then, as we stood there, 
Red Crow made me understand that when his 
horse threw him and he got to his feet, he found 
the bear standing erect facing him, and he had 
fired an arrow into it and taken to the nearest 
tree. I knew the rest. I saw that the arrow had 
pierced the bear's lungs; that it would have bled 
to death anyhow. But my shot had been a 
heart shot, and just in time, for the little tree was 
bending, breaking even as I fired, and the bear 
would have had Red Crow had it not started in 
pursuit of us. 

"The claws, you take them!" Red Crow now 
signed to me. But I refused. I knew how highly 
they were valued for necklace ornaments, and I 
wanted no necklace. Nor did I want the great 
hide, for its new coat was short, and the old win- 
ter coat still clung to it in faded yellow patches. 
Red Crow quickly unjointed the long fore claws, 
and we hunted around and found our ibex hides, 
which had come to the ground with us, and 

8i 



Rising Wolf 

resumed our way in the gathering night. The 
horses had, of course, gone on, and would never 
stop until they found the band in which they 
belonged. 

After the experience we had had, we went on 
with fear in our hearts, imagining that every 
animal we heard moving was a bear. There was 
no moon, and in the thick groves we had to just 
feel our way. But at last we passed the foot of 
the lake and saw the yellow gleaming of the hun- 
dreds of lodges of the camp on the far side of the 
river. The ford was too deep, the water too 
swift for us to cross it on foot, so we called for 
help, and several who heard came over on horse- 
back and took us up behind, and across to the 
camp, where we found Lone Walker was gather- 
ing a party to go in search for us. 

What a welcome we got! The women hugged 
and kissed Red Crow and his sister, and me too, 
just as if I were another son, and Lone Walker 
patted us on the shoulder and followed us into 
the lodge, and fussed at the women to hurry and 

82 



A Fight with the River People 

set food before us. We ate, and let Mink Woman 
tell the story of the day, which she did between 
bites, and oh, how her eyes flashed and the words 
poured out as she described with telling gestures 
our experience with the bear! A crowd of chiefs 
and warriors had come into the lodge when word 
went around that we had killed a big bear, and 
listened to her story with close attention and 
many exclamations of surprise and approval; 
and when she ended, and Red Crow had exhibited 
the huge claws, Lone Walker made a little speech 
to me. I understood enough of it, with his signs, 
to know that he praised me for my bravery in 
going to his son's rescue and giving the bear its 
death shot. 

Let me say here that in those days, with only 
bow and arrows, or a flintlock gun, the bravest 
of hunters generally let the grizzly alone if he 
would only let them alone. The trouble was that 
the grizzly, sure of his terrible strength, only too 
often charged the hunter at sight and without 
the slightest provocation. I have recently read 

83 



Rising Wolf 

Lewis and Clark's "Journal," and find that they 
agree with me that the grizzly, or as they called 
it, the white bear, was a most ferocious and dan- 
gerous animal. 

The chiefs having decided that camp should 
not be moved until the next day. Red Crow and 
his sister took me next morning up a stream now 
called Swift Water, running into the river from 
the west. There were a number of lakes upon it, 
and one of them, just above a falls, was a very 
beautiful sheet of water. Beyond it, at what was 
the head of the main fork of the stream, were 
more great deposits of ice, old Cold Maker's 
leavings. But I was not so much interested in 
them as I was in taking note of the beaver signs, 
which was a part of my duty on this trip of dis- 
covery into the southland. It was the factor's 
intention to send some engages trappers into it if 
I found enough fur to keep them busy. Between 
this lake and a smaller one lying at the foot of 
a great ice sheet, I found no less than thirteen 
dammed ponds, all containing a number of in- 

84 



A Fight with the River People 

habited beaver houses ; and there were a number 
of their ponds farther down the stream. 

Camp was broken the following morning, but 
before the lodges came down I was off on the 
trail with the chiefs. We topped the long, high 
ridge sloping up eastward from the lower lake, 
and looked out upon the greatest expanse of 
mountain- and butte-studded plains that I had 
ever seen. And I thrilled at the thought that 
I was the very first one of my race to see it. 
Lone Walker pointed down to a small stream 
heading in a great patch of pine and spruce on 
the side of the ridge. 

"That is the Little River. Far to the east it 
joins the Big River of the South," he told me, and 
I realized that I was on top of the watershed of 
the Gulf of Mexico. We rode on down to the 
stream and I got off my horse and drank from it 
for good luck. The whites misnamed it when 
they, years afterward, called it Milk River. The 
Blackfoot name was best, for it is a very small 
river for all its three hundred and more miles of 

8S 



Rising Wolf 

length from its source to its junction with the 
Missouri. 

As I drank the swamp-flavored water I thought 
how fine it would be to make a dugout there, and 
voyage down the stream to the Missouri, and 
down that to the Mississippi, and thence to the 
Gulf of Mexico and its tropical shores. What a 
long journey it would be; thousands of miles! 
What strange peoples I should see; tribe after 
tribe of Indians, then Americans, and at last the 
French and the Spanish of the Far South ! And 
what adventure there would be! Fights with 
some of those wild tribes, and with bears, and 
perhaps with lawless whites. They would try 
to take from me the hundreds of beaver pelts 
that I should trap on the way! But no! My 
dugout would not carry many skins, and if I sur- 
vived the dangers I should arrive, poor and rag- 
ged, among a strange people, and have to work 
for them for a few pence a day. "Away with 
you, dream," I said, and mounted my horse and 
rejoined the chiefs. 

86 



A Fight with the River People 

Coming to the southernmost little branch of the 
south fork of the river, Lone Walker, in the lead, 
got down from his horse, examined some tracks 
in the mud, and called out something which 
caused the others to spring from their horses and 
crowd around him. So did I, and saw several 
fresh moccasin tracks. At sight of them the 
chiefs had all become greatly excited, and talked 
so fast that I could understand nothing of what 
they said. I concluded, however, that the tracks 
had been made by some enemy, and saw by 
closer examination that the makers of them had 
worn soft, leather-soled moccasins, very different 
from the parfleche or semi-rawhide soles of all 
Blackfoot summer footwear. 

Looking back on our trail, and seeing a large 
body of warriors coming to take the lead, several 
of the chiefs signaled them to hurry; and when 
they rode up Lone Walker gave some orders that 
sent them scurrying off in all directions. One of 
them presently came back in sight from the tim- 
ber above the crossing, and signed to us to come 

87 



Rising Wolf 

to him. We all mounted and went up, and he led 
us into the timber and to a camping-ground 
where many lodges, several hundred, I thought, 
had recently been pitched. Several of the chiefs 
poked out the ashes of one or two fireplaces and 
uncovered red coals; it was evident that the 
campers had moved away the day before. 

The chiefs were greatly excited over the find, 
and after a short council hurried back to the 
trail and gave orders that we should go into camp 
right there. While we waited for the long 
column to come up I gave Lone Walker the 
query sign — holding my hand up in front of me, 
palm outward, and waving it like the inverted 
pendulum of a clock, and he answered in speech 
and signs both, so that I understood: "The 
campers here were River People. We have for- 
bidden them to come over here on our plains, 
but they keep coming and stealing our buffaloes. 
We shall now make them cry ! '' 

"You are going to fight them?'' I signed. 

"Yes." 

88 



A Fight with the River People 

A queer feeling came over me at his answer. 
I shivered. In my mind's eye I saw a great battle, 
arrows flying and guns booming, and men falling 
and crying out in their death agony. And for 
what ? Just a few of the buffaloes that blackened 
the plains! 

"Don't fight! There are plenty of buffaloes! 
Let the River People go in peace with what few 
they have killed," I signed, but he gave me no 
answer other than a grim smile, and rode out to 
meet the head of the column. 

Word had already gone back the whole length 
of it of our discovery, and as the excited people 
came up to their allotted place in the great circle 
and slung the packs from their horses, the women 
chattering and the men urging them to hurry and 
get out their war clothes, dogs barking and 
horses calling to one another, the din of it all was 
deafening. 

I now learned that, when there was time for 
the change, the warriors put on their war clothes 
before going against the enemy. The change 

89 



Rising Wolf 

was soon made, and it was startling. Somber, 
everyday, plain wear had given place to shirts 
beautifully embroidered with porcupine-quill 
work of bright colors and pleasing design, and 
fringed with white weasel skins and here and 
there scalps of the enemy. The leggings were 
also fringed, and generally painted with figures of 
medicine animals. Not a few wore moccasins of 
solid quill embroidery. Every man had on a war 
bonnet of eagle tail feathers, or horns and weasel 
skins, and carried suspended from his left arm a 
thick, round shield of shrunk bull hide, from the 
circumference of which eagle tail feathers flut- 
tered gayly in the wind. Thus dressed, with bow 
and arrow case on their backs, guns in hand, and 
mounted on their prancing, high-spirited horses, 
the hundreds of warriors who soon gathered 
around us presented the most picturesque and at 
the same time formidable sight that I had ever 
seen. I admired them, and yet they filled me 
with terror against them ; if they chose to attack 
us, our fort, our cannon and guns were as a bar- 

90 



A Fight with the River People 

rier of feathers against the wind ! And I, just a 
boy, was alone with them! I shivered. And 
then Lone Walker spoke kindly to me, and my 
fear died before his smile. 

"Come! We go! You shall see something to 
make your heart glad!" he said. 

I hesitated, and the warriors suddenly broke 
out into a song that I knew must be a song of 
battle. It thrilled me; excited me. I sprang 
upon my horse and we were off. Lone Walker 
signed to me to fall in behind, and I found myself 
riding beside Red Crow at the rear of the swiftly 
moving band. Following the trail of the enemy 
we soon topped a long, brushy slope and turned 
down into a beautiful timbered valley, and up it 
along a broad, clear stream in which I saw many 
a trout leaping for flies, and which, from the 
signs, was alive with beavers. It was the Pu-nak- 
ik-si, or Cutbank River, so named on account 
of the rock walls on both sides of the lower part 
of its valley. 

Three or four miles above where we struck the 
91 



Rising Wolf 

valley it narrowed rapidly, hemmed in by the 
mountains, and we had to slow up, for the nar- 
row trail led on through a thick growth of timber 
and, in places, almost impenetrable brush. 
Then, for a short distance below the forks, the 
valley widened again, and there we passed the 
largest beaver dam that I had ever seen. It ran 
for all of a half-mile from slope to slope across 
the valley, forming a pond of hundreds of acres 
in extent, that was dotted with the lodges of the 
bark eaters. Above it we turned up the south 
fork of the stream and neared the summit of the 
range. The valley narrowed to a width of a few 
hundred yards; ahead a high rock wall crossed 
it, and the trail ran steeply up the right mountain- 
side to gain its rough top. We were a long time 
making that for we were obliged to ride in single 
file because of the narrowness of the trail. The 
chiefs, leading, raised a great shout when they 
reached the edge of the wall, and signed back 
that they could see the enemy. We crowded on 
as fast as we could, Red Crow and I the last to 

92 



A Fight with the River People 

top the wall, and oh, how anxious I was to see 
what was ahead ! 

I saw, and just held my horse and stared and 
stared. For a mile or more from the wall the 
trail still ran south up a rocky slope, then turned, 
and, still rising, ran along a very steep slope to 
the summit of the range. Along that slope the 
trail was black with riders and loose horses, 
hurrying across it at a trot and in single file, and 
back at the turn of the trail the rear guard of 
the fleeing tribe was making a stand against our 
advance. The warriors were afoot, their horses 
having gone on with the column, and our men 
had left their horses and were running on and 
spreading out, those who had guns already begin- 
ning to use them. 

^*Come on! Hurry!" Red Crow shouted to me, 
and was off. I did not follow him, not at first, 
but as the River People's guard retreated and 
our men advanced, I did ride on, dreading to see 
men fall, but withal so fascinated by the fight 
that I could not remain where I was. I went to 

93 



Rising Wolf 

the spot where the enemy had first made their 
stand, and saw several bodies lying among the 
rocks. They had already been scalped. 

The last of the camp movers, the men, women, 
and children with the pack and loose horses, 
had all now crossed the long, steep slope, the 
latter part of which was very steep, and ran 
down to the edge of a cut-walled chasm of tre- 
mendous depth, and had gone out of sight be- 
yond the summit. The guards were now on the 
trail along this most dangerous part of it, our 
warriors following them in single file at long bow 
range, but all of them except two or three in the 
lead, unable to use their weapons. 

It was a duel between these and the two or 
three rear men of the enemy. Our lead man was, 
as I afterward learned. Lone Walker, and the 
men next to him Chiefs Bear Head and Bull- 
Turns-Around. All three had guns and were 
firing and reloading them and firing again as fast 
as they could, and doing terrible execution. One 
after another I saw five of the enemy fall from 

94 



A Fight with the River People 

the trail, which was just a narrow path in the 
shde rock, and go bouncing and whirHng down, 
and off the edge of that great cHff into space. It 
was a terrible sight! It made me tremble! I 
strained my body as I sat there on my horse, 
scrouged down as each one fell. 

I could not see that any of our warriors were 
falling; they were keeping themselves pretty 
well protected with their shields. Capping the 
slope where all this was going on was a long, 
narrow wall of rock running out from the summit 
of the range, and happening to glance up at it 
Isaw numbers of the enemy hurrying out along 
it to get opposite our men and shoot down at 
them. I instantly urged my horse forward, 
shouting as loud as I could, but no one looked 
back and I knew that I was not heard. I went on 
to where the horses had been left, jumped from 
mine there and ran on out along the slope, shout- 
ing again and pointing up to the top of the rock 
wall. At last some one saw me, and gave the 
alarm, and the whole party stopped and looked 

95 



Rising Wolf 

at me, then up where I was pointing and saw 
their danger, and all turned and started to 
retreat. 

But they had no more than started than the 
enemy began firing down at them. It was a long 
way down, several hundred yards, and their 
arrows and the few balls they fired did no dam- 
age ; and seeing that, one of the enemy toppled a 
boulder off the cliff. It struck the slope with a 
loud crash and rolled and bounded on almost as 
swiftly as a ball from a gun, and I expected it to 
hurl three or four of our running men off the trail 
and down over the edge of the cliff. But when 
within twenty or thirty feet of the line it bounded 
high from the slope and shot out away over the 
trail, and away out over the cliff, and long after- 
ward I heard it crash onto the bottom of the 
chasm. 

Now the enemy abandoned their weapons and 
began, all of them, to hurl boulders down onto 
the slope. Had they done that at first they 
would likely have swept many of our men off the 

96 



A Fight with the River People 

trail and over the cliff; but now the most of them 
had passed the danger Hne. As the last of them 
were running out from under the outer point of 
the wall, a man there loosed a last big rock; it 
broke into many pieces when it hit the slope, and 
these went hurtling down with tremendous speed. 
There was no possibility of dodging them; two 
men were struck; one of them rolled down to the 
cliff and off it, but the other, the very last in the 
line, was whirled around, and as he dropped, 
half on and half off the trail, the man next to him 
turned back and helped him to his feet, and 
without further assistance he staggered on to 
safety. He was Lone Walker. His right shoul- 
der was broken and terribly bruised. The man 
we had lost was Short Arrow, young, just re- 
cently made a warrior. 

We all gathered where the horses had been left, 
and a doctor man bound the chief's wound as 
best he could. There was much talk of Short 
Arrow's sudden going, and regret for it; and 
there was rejoicing, too; the enemy had paid 

97 



Rising Wolf 

dearly, seven lives, for what buffalo and other 
game they had killed out on the Blackfeet plains. 

The sun was setting. As we tightened saddle 
cinches and prepared to go, we had a last look 
out along the slope. A great crowd of people was 
gathered on the summit watching us, and up on 
the wall top over the trail, sharply outlined 
against the sunset sky, dozens of warriors were 
gathering piles of rocks to hurl down at us should 
we again attempt to cross the slope. Our chiefs 
had no thought of it. The enemy had been 
sufficiently punished, and anyhow the stand that 
they had taken was unassailable. We got onto 
our horses and hurried to get down into the val- 
ley below the rock wall while there was still a 
little light, and from there on let the horses take 
us home. 

We arrived in camp long after midnight. The 
people were still up, awaiting our return, and the 
greeting that we got surprised me. The women 
and old men gathered around us, shouting the 
names of the warriors, praising them for their 

98 



A Fight with the River People 

bravery, and giving thanks to the gods for their 
safe return. But there was mourning too ; when 
the noise of the greeting subsided we could hear 
the relatives of Short Arrow waihng over their 
loss. 

I did not sleep much that night ; every time I 
fell into a doze I saw the bodies of the enemy 
bounding down that rocky slope and off the edge 
of the thousand foot wall, and awoke with a start. 

Although suffering great pain in his shoulder, 
Lone Walker the next morning declared that he 
was able to travel, and camp was soon broken. 
After crossing the valley of Cutbank River we 
left the big south trail, turning off from it to the 
southeast, and after a time striking the valley 
of another stream, the Nat-ok-i-o-kan, or Two- 
Medicine-Lodge River. I learned that this was 
the main fork of Kyai-is-i-sak-ta, or Bear River, 
the stream which Lewis and Clark had named 
Maria's River, after the sweetheart of one of 
them.'|But I did not know that for many a year 
after I first saw it. 

99 



Rising Wolf 

We went into camp in a heavily timbered bot- 
tom walled on the north side by a long, high 
cliff, at the foot of which was a great corral in 
the shape of a half circle, the cliff itself forming 
the back part of it. It was built of fallen trees, 
driftwood from the river, and boulders, and was 
very high and strong. Red Crow told me that it 
was a buffalo trap; that whole herds of buffaloes 
were driven off the cliff into it. I could not 
understand much of what he told me, but later 
on saw a great herd decoyed to a cliff and stam- 
peded over it, a waterfall of huge, brown, whirl- 
ing animals. It was a wonderful spectacle. I 
shall have something to say about that later on. 

I now learned that we had come to this par- 
ticular camping place for the purpose of building 
a great lodge offering, called o-kan, or his dream, 
to the sun. When we went into camp the lodges 
were not put up in the usual formation, but were 
set to form a great circle on the level, grassy bot- 
tom between the timber, bordering the stream, 
and the cliff. In the center of this circle, the 

loo 



A Fight with the River People 

sacred lodge was to be erected with ceremonies 
that would last for some days. 

On the following morning Red Crow and I, 
Mink Woman accompanying us, went hunting; 
we were to bring in enough meat to last our two 
lodges until the great festival ended. As usual, 
we started out very early, long before the great 
majority of the hunters were up. We rode down 
the valley through a number of bottoms of vary- 
ing size, seeing a few deer, a band of antelopes, 
and two or three elk, but finding no buffaloes until 
we neared the junction of the river with another 
stream, which Red Crow told me was Mi-sin-ski- 
is-i-sak-ta (Striped-Face — or, in other words, 
Badger River). There, on the point between the 
two streams, we discovered a large herd of buf- 
faloes filing down into the bottom to drink. We 
hurried on through the timber to get ahead of 
them, intending to hide in the brush on the point 
of land between the streams and dash into them 
when they came near. But as buffaloes often did, 
they suddenly broke into a run when part way 

lOI 



Rising Wolf 

down the slope, their thirst and sight of the water 
urging them forward, so we crossed the river, and 
riding in the shelter of the willows made our ap- 
proach. They had all crowded out on the narrow 
point of land ahead and were drinking from both 
streams. 

"We will kill many!" Red Crow signed to me 
as we rode through the willows, and then out 
from the stream in the shelter of some clumps of 
berry brush, through which we could glimpse the 
solidly packed rows of the drinking animals. 
That was my thought, too, for I saw that we 
could get within fifty or sixty yards of them be- 
fore they discovered our approach. I loosed the 
pistols in my belt, and slipped the case from my 
gun as we made our way into the last piece of 
brush ; when we went out of it. Red Crow signed 
to me, we were to charge. Just then a gun 
boomed somewhere ahead of us," and at the 
report the buffaloes whirled out from the streams 
and with a thunder and rattle of hoofs came 
straight toward us, a solid mass of several hun- 

I02 



A Fight with the River People 

dred head that covered the width of the point. 
Red Crow yelled something to us, but we could 
not hear him. We all turned about, the girl let- 
ting go the two horses she was leading, and fled. 
Unless our horses could outrun the stampede 
they were sure to be gored, and down we would 
go to a terrible death ! 



CHAPTER V 

BUFFALO HUNTING 

WHEN we cleared that brush patch I 
looked back. The buffaloes were no more 
than fifty yards behind us and the brush was 
gone, trampled down to its roots. I did not see 
the two horses that Mink Woman had been 
leading, or think of them at that time; my one 
thought was to get away from that onrushing 
wall of shaggy, sharp-horned, bobbing heads. 
Red Crow, frantically thumping his horse with 
his heels, was leading us, heading obliquely 
toward Badger River, and waving to us to follow 
him. Mink Woman was just ahead of me, but 
she had the slower horse and I was gaining upon 
her, even as the buffaloes were gaining upon us 
all. I wondered if we could possibly clear their 
front. I rode up beside the girl, on her left, and 
hung there to protect her as best I could. Nearer 
and nearer came the buffaloes. When they were 

104 



Buffalo Hunting 

within fifty feet of us, and we still fifty or sixty 
yards from the river, I fired my gun at them and 
to my surprise dropped a big cow. But that had 
no effect upon the others; they surged on over 
her body as though it were no more than an ant 
hill. 

"I must try again!" I said to myself and hold- 
ing gun and bridle in my right hand, drew a 
pistol with my left. It was to be my last shot, 
and I held it as long as I could. We neared the 
river; the herd kept gaining upon us, came up to 
us and I leaned out and fired straight at a big 
head that I could almost touch with the muzzle 
of the pistol. It dropped. Looking ahead then 
I saw that we were close to the edge of a high 
cutbank at the edge of the river, saw Red Crow 
leap his horse from it and go out of sight ; a 
couple more jumps of our horses and we, too, 
would clear it. But just then a big head thumped 
into the side of my horse, knocking him against 
Mink Woman's horse. As I felt him falling with 
me I let go pistol and gun and bridle, and reach- 



Rising Wolf 

ing out blindly grasped the mane of her horse 
with both hands and swung free. The next in- 
stant another big head struck her horse a mighty 
thud in the flank and whirled him half around 
and off the cutbank, and down we went with a 
splash into deep water; we were safe! 

I let go the horse, and the girl, still on its back, 
swam it downstream to shallow water, I follow- 
ing, and we finally passed below the cutbank 
and went ashore on the point, Red Crow going 
out a little ahead of us. A man skinning a buf- 
falo there whirled around and stared at us open- 
mouthed, and then cried: *'What has happened 
to you?" 

"You did it, you stampeded the buffaloes onto 
us! We have had a narrow escape!'' Red Crow 
answered. 

But my one thought now was of my gun and 
pistol; I ran on to find them, dreading to see 
them trampled into useless pieces of wood and 
iron, and the hunter mounted his horse and came 
with the others after me. 

io6 



BuflFalo Hunting 

It was a couple of hundred yards up to where 
we had made our sudden turn, and there in the 
trampled and broken brush patch we found the 
two pack horses, frightfully gored and trampled, 
both dead. Mink Woman had led them by a 
single, strong rawhide rope, and the buflfaloes 
striking it had dragged them, gored them, 
knocked them off their feet. 

We went on, past the first buffalo that I had 
killed, and soon came to the other one, and just 
beyond it to my horse, disemboweled, down, and 
dying. Red Crow put an arrow into him and 
ended his misery. Just in front of him lay my 
gun, and I gave a shout of joy when I saw that it 
had not been trampled. We could not find the 
pistol, and it occurred to me that it might be 
under the dead horse; we turned him over and 
there it was, pressed hard into the ground but 
unbroken! We looked at one another and 
laughed, and Red Crow sang the "I Don't Care" 
song — I did not know it then — and the hunter 
said : "All is well ! You have lost horses, they are 

107 



Elising Wolf 

nothing. You are wet, your clothes will dry. 
You have two fat buffaloes, be glad!" 

And at that we laughed again. But I guess 
that my laugh had a little shake in it; I kept 
seeing that terrible wall of frightened buffaloes 
thundering out upon us ! 

The first thing that I did was to reload my gun 
and recovered pistol, and draw the wet charge 
and reload it. Then Mink Woman and I turned 
to our two buffaloes and Red Crow hurried home 
for horses to replace those that we had lost. It 
was late afternoon when we got into camp with 
our loads of meat. So ended another experience 
in my early life on the plains. 

During the following days of our encampment 
there on the Two Medicine, the whole time was 
given over to the ceremonies of the o-kan, or 
medicine lodge, as our company men came to call 
it, and I was surprised to learn by it how intensely 
religious these people were, and how sincerely 
they reverenced and honored their gods. My 
greatest surprise came at the start, when I 

io8 



Buffalo Hunting 

learned that it was women, not men, who had 
vowed to build the great lodge to the sun, the 
men merely assisting them. It was then, too, 
that I got my first insight into the important 
position of women in the tribe; they were far 
from being the slaves and drudges that I had 
been told they were. 

During the year that had passed a number of 
women had vowed to the sun to build this sacri- 
fice to him if he would cure some loved relative 
of his illness, or bring him safely home from the 
war trail, and those whose prayers were granted 
now banded together, under the lead of the most 
experienced one of their number, to fulfill their 
vows. The different ceremonies were very intri- 
cate, and to me, with my slight knowledge of 
the language, quite mysterious. But, Christian 
though I was, I was completely carried away by 
them, and took part in some of them as I was 
told to do by Lone Walker and his family. 

On the day after the great lodge was put up,' 
Red Crow's mother took him and Mink Woman 

109 



Rising Wolf 

and me into it, and had one of the medicine 
women give us each a small piece of the sacred 
dried buffalo tongues which were being handed 
to all the people as they came in for them. I held 
mine, watching what the others did with theirs, 
and then, when my turn came, I held it up to 
the sky and made a little prayer to the sun for 
good health, long life, and happiness, and having 
said that, I buried a part of the meat in the 
ground, at the same time crying out: "Hai-yu! 
Sak-wi-ah-ki, kim-o-ket!" (Oh, you! Earth 
Mother, pity me !) 

After that was done the mother and Red Crow 
and his sister made sacrifices to the sun, giving a 
beautifully embroidered robe, a bone necklace, 
and a war bonnet, which a medicine man hung to 
the roof poles while they prayed. But I was not 
forgotten; the good mother handed me a pair 
of new, embroidered moccasins and told me to 
hand them to the medicine man to hang up, and 
prayed for me while he did so. I could not 
understand half of it, but enough to know that 

no 



BuflFalo Hunting 

in her I had a true friend, a second mother as 
it were. 

On the following day I learned that I had a 
second father, too. The warriors, gathered in 
front of the great lodge, were one by one count- 
ing their coups, their deeds of bravery, with the 
aid of friends enacting each scene of battle, and 
showing just how they had conquered the enemy. 
It was all like a play ; a very interesting play. As 
Red Crow and I stood at the edge of the crowd 
looking on, Lone Walker saw us, raised his hand 
for silence, and said loudly, so that all could hear : 
"There stand my two sons, my red son and my 
white son. Come, son Red Crow, count coups 
for yourself and your brother, too, as he cannot 
yet speak our language well." 

At that Red Crow took my hand and we 
walked out in front of the chief, turned and 
faced the crowd, and then Red Crow described 
how we had killed the big grizzly, I going to 
his rescue and giving it the death shot just in 
time to save him. He ended, and the drum- 

III 



Rising Wolf 

mers stationed beside the chiefs banged their 
drums, and the people shouted their approval. 
Following that, Lone Walker again addressed 
the crowd : " By that brave deed which you have 
heard, my white son has earned a name for him- 
self," he said. *'It was a brave deed; by his 
quick rush in and timely shot he saved my red 
son's life, and so he must have a brave and good 
man's name. I give him the name of one who 
has recently gone from us in his old age. Look 
at him, all of you, my son. Rising Wolf!" 

And at that the people again shouted approval, 
and the drummers banged their drums. Of 
course I did not know then all that he had said, 
but I did know that I had been named Mah-kwi- 
i-po-ats (Wolf Rising, or, as the whites prefer to 
translate it. Rising Wolf). 

The preparations for building the o-kan re- 
quired two days' time; the attendant ceremonies 
four days more, four, the sacred number, the 
number of the world directions, north, south, 
east, and west. On the morning following the 

112 



Buflfalo Hunting 

last day of the ceremonies we broke camp and, 
leaving the great lodge and its wealth of sun offer- 
ings to the elements, moved south again, or, 
rather, southwest, in order to regain the moun- 
tain trail. Their religious duties fulfilled, the 
people were very happy, and I felt as light- 
hearted as any of them, and eager to see more — 
see all of their great country. 

We crossed Badger River, and then Sik-o-kin- 
is-i-sak-ta, or Black Barkbirch River, and en- 
camped on a small stream named 0-saks-i-i-tuk- 
tai. Back Fat, or as our French voyageurs later 
translated it, Depouille Creek. From there our 
next camp was on Kok-sis-tuk-wi-a-tuk-tai 
(Point-of-Rocks River). I never knew why the 
whites named it Sun River. Nor did I dream 
that the day was to come when I would see its 
broad bottoms fenced in and irrigated, and a fort 
built upon it to house blue-coated American 
soldiers. If I then gave the future any thought, 
it was that those great plains and mountains 
would ever be the hunting-ground of the Black- 

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Rising Wolf 

feet, and the unfailing source of a great supply of 
furs for our company. 

We camped on this stream well out from the 
mountains, and the next morning, moving on, at 
noon arrived at its junction with a great river 
which at first sight I knew must be the Missouri, 
the 0-muk-at-ai of the Blackfeet tribes. Below, 
not far away by the sound, I could hear the dull 
roar of a waterfall. We turned downstream, 
crossed on a swift and fairly deep ford above the 
falls, and went into camp. As soon as the lodges 
were up and the women had cooked some meat 
for us. Red Crow and I saddled fresh horses and 
struck out to see the country. We had come to 
the trail of Lewis and Clark, and I was anxious 
to learn if they had had any followers, if the 
American Fur Company's men had come into 
the country, as my factor feared. 

We rode to the fall, and after looking at it 
moved on down and came upon an old and very 
dim trail along which lay here and there log cut- 
tings about eight feet long and a foot or more in 

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Buffalo Hunting 

diameter. They were well worn; small pieces of 
rock and gravel were embedded in them, and I 
saw at once that they had been used for rollers 
under boats in portaging them around the falls. 
I realized how great a task that had been when 
Red Crow guided me down to all the falls, the 
last a number of miles below our camp. The 
Blackfoot name for the falls is I-pum-is-tuk-wi 
(Rock-Wall-across-the-River.) 

Sitting on the shore of the river below the last 
falls, at the point where the portage had begun, I 
tried to get some information from Red Crow as 
to the white men who had passed up there, but 
he could tell me nothing. As we talked I was 
idly heaping a pile of sand before me, and in 
doing so uncovered two long, rusty spikes. 

** What a find ! What a rich find ! Give me one 
of them," Red Crow exclaimed, and I handed 
him one. 

"See! It is long. It will make two arrow 
points," he explained. And at that I carefully 
pocketed mine. Material for arrowheads, iron, 

IIS 



Rising Wolf 

I mean, was very valuable at that time, in that 
country. Our company was selling arrow points 
of hoop iron at the rate of a beaver skin for 
six points. Some of the Blackfeet hunters were 
still using flint points which they made them- 
selves. 

And that reminds me of something. At the 
foot of the buffalo trap cliffs on the Two Medicine 
I picked up one evening a number of flint and 
obsidian arrow points, many of them perfectly 
and beautifully fashioned. I took them to the 
lodge and offered them to Lone Walker, thinking 
that I was doing him a good turn. But he started 
back from them as though they had been a 
rattlesnake, and refused to even touch them. 
"Some of those, especially the black ones, are 
surely Crow points, and so unlucky to us," he 
explained. "This was Crow country. We took 
it from them. Maybe our fathers killed the 
owners of those points. But the shadows of the 
dead keep coming back to watch their property, 
and cause sickness, trouble, to any who take it. 

ii6 



Buffalo Hunting 

I wish that you would take the points back where 
you got them and leave them there." 

I did so, but carefully cached them under a 
rock, and years later recovered them. But that 
is not all. After returning to the lodge I asked 
Lone Walker where the people obtained the 
black, as they called it, ice rock for making 
their arrows, and he told me that away to the 
south, near the head of Elk River, or in other 
words, the Yellowstone, were springs of boiling 
water, some of them shooting high in the air 
with tremendous roaring, and that near one of 
these springs was a whole butte of the ice rock, 
and it was there that his people went to get their 
supply. "But it is a dreadful place!" he con- 
cluded. ** We approach it with fear in our hearts, 
and make great sacrifices to the gods to protect 
us. And as soon as we arrive at the ice rock 
butte we snatch up what we need of it and hurry 
away." 

He was telling me, of course, of the wonder- 
ful geysers of the Yellowstone. I believe that 

117 



Rising Wolf 

I am the first white person who ever heard of 
them. 

But to continue: When Red Crow and I re- 
turned home that evening, I asked Lone Walker 
if his people had seen the white men who had 
left the cut logs in the trail around the falls, and 
he replied that neither the Pi-kun-i, nor any other 
of the Blackfeet tribes had seen them, but he 
himself had heard of them from the Earth House 
People — theMandans — when visiting them sev- 
eral summers back. They had been a large party, 
traveling in boats, had wintered with the Man- 
dans and gone westward, even to the Every- 
wheres-water of the west, and the next summer 
had come back, this time on horses instead of in 
boats. If you have read Lewis and Clark's 
** Journal," you will remember that they met 
and fought — on what must have been Cutbank 
River — some people that they thought were 
Blackfeet. They were not. They must have 
been a war party of Crows or some other tribe 
going through the country. 

ii8 



Buffalo Hunting 

I next asked Lone Walker if he had ever seen 
white men on the Missouri River waters. 

"Two. In the Mandan camp. Of a race the 
Mandans call Nothing White Men," he answered. 

And from that time the Blackfoot name for 
the French has been Kis-tap-ap-i-kwaks (Useless, 
or Nothing White Men), as distinguishing them 
from the English, the Red Coats, and the Ameri- 
cans, Long Knives. 

Lone Walker's answer pleased me ; It was evi- 
dent that the American Fur Company had not en- 
tered the Blackfoot, or even the Mandan country, 
far below. But even then that company was 
pushing, pushing its forts farther and farther up 
the Missouri, and the day was coming, far off but 
coming, when I would be one of its employees ! 

We camped there at the falls several days and 
hunted buffaloes, making several big runs and 
killing all the meat that was wanted at that time. 
Our lodges were pitched close to the river, right 
where the whites are now building the town they 
have named Great Falls. 

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Rising Wolf 

Our next move was out to the point of the 
little spur of the mountains that is named High- 
wood. Its slopes were just alive with deer and 
elk, especially elk, and Red Crow and I killed 
two of them, big fat bulls, for a change of meat 
for our lodges. We did all the hunting for Lone 
Walker's big family; they required an awful lot 
of meat ; of fresh meat about three pounds a day 
for each person, and each day there were also a 
number of guests to be fed. At a rough guess I 
put the amount that we used at three hundred 
pounds a day. Do you wonder that Red Crow 
and I, and Mink Woman helping us, were kept 
pretty busy? 

Leaving the Highwood we moved out to Arrow 
River (Ap-si-is-i-sak-ta), and once more I felt 
that I was in country that white men had never 
seen. The Arrow River valley is for most of its 
course a deep, walled gash in the plains; there 
are long stretches of it where neither man nor any 
animal, except the bighorn, can climb its red 
rock cliffs. But the moment I first set eyes upon 

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Buffalo Hunting 

it, I liked it. I always did like cliffs, their ledges, 
and caves hiding one can never tell what mys- 
teries. There were many bighorn along these 
cliffs, and mule deer were plentiful in all the 
rough breaks of the valley. Out on the plains 
endless herds of buffaloes and antelopes grazed, 
coming daily down steep and narrow, deep- 
worn trails to drink at the river ; and in the valley 
itself every patch of timber fringing the stream 
sheltered white-tailed deer and elk. There were 
many beavers, pond beavers and bank beavers, 
along the stream. Bear tracks were everywhere 
to be seen, in the dusty game trails, and in the 
river shore sands. 

We wound down into the deep canyon by 
following a well-worn game trail down a coulee 
several miles in length, and when we went into 
camp between a fine cottonwood grove and the 
stream, and Lone Walker said that we would 
remain there for some time, I was much pleased, 
for I wanted to do a lot of hunting and exploring 
along the cliffs with Red Crow. 

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Rising Wolf 

We could not do it the next day, for we had to 
get meat for the two lodges. That was not diffi- 
cult. With Mink Woman to help us, and leading 
six pack horses, we left very early in the morning 
and rode down the valley for four or five miles, 
examining the many game trails that came into 
the valley; there was one in every break, every 
coulee cutting the rock wall formation. We at 
last struck a well-worn trail that came into the 
valley through a gap in the cliff not twenty feet 
wide, and under a projecting rock shelf about ten 
feet high. We saw that we could climb onto the 
shelf, and shoot straight down at the game as it 
passed, so Red Crow rode up the trail to look 
out on the plain and learn if it would pay us to 
make our stand there. He was gone a long time, 
and when he returned said that a very large herd 
of buffaloes was out beyond the head of the cou- 
lee, and slowly grazing toward it; he thought 
that it would be coming in to water before noon. 
We therefore hid our horses in some timber 
below the mouth of the coulee, and then all 

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Buffalo Hunting 

three climbed up on the rock shelf and sat down. 
I held my gun ready, laid a pistol on either side 
of me, and Red Crow strung his bow and got out 
a handful of arrows. 

It was hot there on that shelf. The sun blazed 
down upon us, and we could not have held out 
had not a light wind been blowing down the cou- 
lee. It was past noon when a most peculiar 
noise came to us with the wind ; a deep, roaring 
noise like distant, but steady thunder. I asked 
what caused it. 

"It is the bulls; the buffalo bulls are grunt- 
ing because now is their mating season," Red 
Crow explained. "They now take wives. They 
are very mad; they fight one another, and night 
and day keep up that grunting." 

The noise became louder and louder. "They 
come. They are coming now to drink," said Red 
Crow, and soon after that we saw the lead of the 
herd coming around a bend in the coulee. A 
number of bulls came first, heads down, and 
swaying as they walked with ponderous tread, 

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Rising Wolf 

and as they came nearer I saw that they were 
making that peculiar noise with their mouths 
closed, or all but closed. It was what I called a 
grunting bellow, very deep sounding, long sus- 
tained, a sound wholly unlike any other sound in 
the world. It was a sound that exactly fitted the 
animal that made it. As the buffalo's appear- 
ance was ever that of a forbidding, melancholy 
animal brooding over strange mysteries, so was 
its close-mouthed bellowing expressive of great 
sadness, and unfathomable mystery; of age-old 
mysteries that man can never penetrate. Often, 
as we gazed at bulls standing on some high point, 
and as motionless as though of stone, Indians 
have said to me: "They know! They know 
everything, they see everything! Nothing has 
been hidden from them from the time Old Man 
made the world and put them upon it!" 

Perhaps so ! Let us not be too sure that we are 
the only wise ones that roam this earth ! 

Well, the herd came on, the bulls moaning and 
switching and cocking up their short, tufted 

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Buffalo Hunting 

tails, and presently the coulee was full of the 
animals as far as we could see. We had drawn 
back from the edge of the shelf and sat motion- 
less, only our heads in view, and so we remained 
until the head of the long column had passed 
out into the bottom. I then leaned forward, and 
Red Crow sprang to his feet, and we began shoot- 
ing down, choosing always animals with the 
broadest, most rounding hips, and therefore the 
fattest meat. With my rifle, and one after the 
other my pistols, I shot three good cows, and 
Red Crow shot four with his bow and arrows. 
All seven of them fell close around the mouth of 
the coulee. Those that had passed out into the 
bottom, unhurt, ran off down the valley. The 
rest, back up the coulee, turned and went up on 
the plain, in their hurry and scrambling raising 
such a cloud of dust that we nearly strangled in 
it. We got down from the shelf and began butch- 
ering our kills, taking only the best of the meat 
with the hides. We got into the camp before 
sundown, our horses staggering under their heavy 

I2S 



Rising Wolf 

loads. We had broiled tongue for our evening 
meal. 

Yes, buffalo tongue, a whole one each of us, 
and some service berries, were what the women 
set before us that evening. How is it that I 
remember all those little details of the vanished 
years ? I cannot remember what happened last 
year, or the year before, yet all of that long ago 
time is as plain to me as my hand before my face ! 

The next morning, with pieces of dry meat and 
back fat in our hands for breakfast. Red Crow and 
I rode out of camp at daylight for a day on the 
cliffs. On the previous day we had seen numbers 
of bighorn along them, and, opposite the mouth 
of the coulee where we had killed the buffaloes, 
had discovered what we thought was the en- 
trance to a cave. We wanted to see that. We 
had told Mink Woman that she could not go 
with us, but after going down the valley for a 
mile or more found her close at our heels. Nor 
would she go back: "I want to see that cave as 
much as you do," she said. "I help you hunt, 

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Buffalo Hunting 

and butcher your kills; it is only fair that you 
do something for me now and then." 

It was a beautiful morning, clear, cool, wind- 
less. As we rode along we saw deer and elk 
dodging out of our way, a beaver now and then 
and coveys of sage hens and prairie grouse. 
While waiting for the buffaloes to come in, the 
day before, we had looked out a way by which we 
thought it would be possible to reach the cave, 
and now, leaving the horses a half mile or more 
above our stand on the shelf, we began the ascent 
of the cliffs. The cave was located at the back of 
a very long shelf about two thirds of the way up 
the canyon side, and we believed that we could 
reach its western end by climbing the series of 
small shelves and sleep slopes under that part 
of it. 

We climbed a fifty-foot slope of fallen boulders 
and came to the first shelf, a couple of feet higher 
than our heads, and Red Crow told me to use 
his back as a mount, and go up first. He leaned 
against the rock wall, bending over. I handed 

127 



Rising Wolf 

my gun to Mink Woman and, stepping up on his 
back and then on his shoulders, and steadying 
myself by keeping my hands against the wall, 
straightened up; and as my head rose above 
the level of the shelf I saw something that made 
me gasp. 

t 



CHAPTER VI 

CAMPING ON ARROW RIVER 

WITH flattened ears and a menacing snarl 
a mountain lion, not four feet back, was 
crouching and nervously shuffling her forefeet 
for a spring at me, and three or four small 
young ones behind her all had their backs arched 
and were spitting and growling too. I ducked 
down so quickly that I lost my balance and 
tumbled onto the rocks, but luckily the fall did 
not hurt me. I was up on my feet at once. 

"What was it?" Red Crow asked. 

"A big lion! It has little young ones. It was 
making ready to spring at me,'" I answered, and 
at that he became greatly excited. 

"Quick! Let me have your gun! Help me 
up!" he exclaimed, and I went to the wall and 
bent over, and Mink Woman handed him the 
gun after he had gotten upon my back. He 
straightened up, and I expected to hear him 

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Rising Wolf 

shoot; but instead he called down to us: ''They 
are gone!" and sprang upon the shelf and we 
heard a scuff or two of his moccasins as he ran 
off. At that Mink Woman helped me get upon 
the shelf, and I then drew her up, and we ran 
around a bend of it just in time to see Red Crow, 
farther on, lay down my gun, draw his bow and 
arrows, and begin shooting at something that 
seemed to be in a crevice of the cliff at the back 
of the shelf. We hurried on to him and found 
that he had killed the lion there where she had 
made her stand in front of her young, and as we 
came up to him he shot the last of the little ones. 
There were four of them. He was mightily 
pleased at what he had done, for the hide of a 
mountain lion was valued by the Blackfeet 
tribes above that of any other animal. It was 
beheved to bring good luck in hunting and in 
war to the owner, and was either fashioned into a 
bow case and quiver, or softly tanned and used 
as a saddle robe. 
While we were skinning the animals I asked my 
130 



Camping on Arrow River 

friend why he had not used my gun to kill the 
old one. 

" Never the gun when the bow will do as well !" 
he answered. "The bow is silent. The gun goes 
whoom! and for far around all ears take notice 
of it." 

There was sound sense in what he said. I 
determined that I would no longer delay getting 
a bow and learning to use it. We little thought 
that we were to prove his saying on the height 
above us. If he had fired the gun at the lion it 
is likely that I would not be sitting here telling 
you my story of those vanished days. 

Having skinned the lions we folded the hides 
flesh side together, so that they would not dry 
out, and would be fresh and soft to stretch 
properly when we got them to camp, and packed 
them with us; they were light and would not 
interfere with our climbing. We went back to 
where we had come up on the shelf, and then 
zigzagged our way up from shelf to shelf, all the 
time in a deep recess in the great cliflf. On the 

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Rising Wolf 

shelf above the one on which we got the lions, 
were the remains of a yearling bighorn which the 
old lion had apparently killed that morning, and 
that explained, we thought, why we had seen 
none of the animals thereabout. On the previous 
day we had seen several small bands there. 

At last we climbed onto the cave shelf. From 
where we struck it, it ran out toward the valley 
and then circled around the projecting point of 
the formation, and ended in a recess similar to 
the one we had come up in. The cave was on 
our side of the point; about a hundred yards 
from it. We hurried out along the shelf, eager 
to get to the cave and explore it, but upon reach- 
ing the entrance our haste died right there ; it was 
a mighty black hole we were looking into; a 
rank, damp, cold odor came from it; we could 
see in only a few yards; the darkness beyond 
might conceal something of great danger to us ! 
A grizzly, I thought, and my companions' fears 
included ghosts ; the shadows of the dead always 
lurking about to do the living harm. 

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Camping on Arrow River 

Said Red Crow at last, and the set expression 
of his face belied his words : " Ha ! I am not afraid ! 
Let's go in!" 

*'Come on," I told him, and led the way. 

"I am afraid! I shall wait for you here!" 
Mink Woman told us. But she did n't. We had 
taken but a few steps when she was dose behind 
us, feeling safest there. 

A few yards in, the cave narrowed to but little 
more than three feet, and then widened out 
again into a big, jagged-walled and high-roofed 
room. We could see but little of it at first, for 
we were blocking the light; but after leaving the 
narrow passage, and as our eyes became accus- 
tomed to the darkness, we saw that the room was 
the end of the cave. We stood still, hardly 
breathing, listening for any movement there; 
watching for shining eyes; and at last con- 
cluded that the place was harmless enough. 
Then I, farthest in, saw something, a dim, white, 
queerly shaped object on the floor at the back 
of the room. I stared at it a long time, made 

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Rising Wolf 

sure that whatever it was it had no life, and then 
moved on. The others then saw it and Red Crow 
exclaimed : " What is it ? What is it ? " 

We moved on again, and saw at last that our 
find was a number of painted and fringed raw- 
hide war cylinders, receptacles in which warriors 
carried their war bonnets and war clothes when 
on a raid. 

"Ghosts' property! Do not touch them!" 
Mink Woman exclaimed, but I was already lifting 
one of them, and as I did so it gave off a fresh 
odor of sweet grass smoke, a medicine — a sacred 
perfume of the Blackfeet tribes, I knew. I held 
it under Red Crow's nose and he sniffed at it and 
exclaimed: "Newly smoked!" He then took it 
and held it up in better light, and pointed to the 
painted design: "Crow! Crow painting!" he 
exclaimed, and turned quickly and stared out the 
way we had come; so did I. There was no one 
insight. All was quiet; but we felt sure that the 
enemy was not far away ! 

I turned back and counted the cylinders; there 
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Camping on Arrow River 

were seven, and with them were coils of rawhide 
rope, several bridles with Spanish bits, the first 
that I had ever seen, and did n't then know were 
of that make, and three square-shaped rawhide 
pouches with slings for carrying. I put my hand 
into one of them and brought forth a piece of 
freshly roasted meat! That settled it; a Crow 
war party was somewhere on the cliffs about 
us; they had perhaps slept here, and were now 
out on watch. I thought it strange that they 
had not seen us. Said Red Crow: "They must 
be sitting out around the point. Just think! If 
I had fired the gun at the lion we would now be 
without scalps!'' 

And at that he gave a little laugh; a scared 
little laugh, his eyes all the time on the cave 
entrance, as were mine, and Mink Woman's. 

**What shall we do?" she whispered. 

"Take these things and run," I said. 

"No!" said Red Crow, and took from me the 
pouch, put the roast meat back and laid it in 
its place in the pile. "Come!" he said, and we 

I3S 



Rising Wolf 

followed him out. At the entrance we looked off 
along the length of the shelf as far as we could see 
its rounding curve; no one was in sight. We 
ran, ran for our lives back the way we had come, 
our backs twitching in expectation of arrow 
piercings. We reached the end of the shelf in 
the recess, halted a moment for a last look back, 
and seeing no one, went quickly down the slopes 
and over the shelves to the bottom, and thence 
to our picketed horses. Not until we reached 
them did we feel really safe. 

"There! We survive!" Red Crow exclaimed. 
" I go for help ! We shall wipe out those Crows ! 
Hasten, you two; go down to the place of our 
buffalo killing and keep watch for them, but don't 
let them think that you know they are there on 
the cliffs. I shall come back as soon as I can." 

He left us, and Mink Woman and I rode down 
to the mouth of the deep coulee, picketed our 
horses just below it, and then got onto the shelf 
from which we had shot the buffaloes the day 
before; and not until then did we actually begin 

136 



Camping on Arrow River 

our watch. I sat facing the bottom of the coulee, 
looking up it the most of the time just as though 
I were waiting for a herd of buffaloes to come 
down for water, and Mink Woman pretended to 
be looking up and down the canyon, but most of 
the time her eyes were upon the high, rounding 
point of the cliff opposite us, and in particular 
the cave shelf. We felt sure that somewhere up 
there the enemy lay concealed and was watching 
us. It was likely that, coming across the plain in 
the early morning, they had seen some of our 
people riding out to hunt, and had taken refuge 
in the cliff with the expectation of finding our 
camp and raiding our horses when night came. 

It was mid-afternoon when we saw a number of 
riders, twenty or thirty, coming down the valley. 
They appeared to be in no haste, but when they 
had come close the sweat on their horses told us 
that they had ridden hard the most of the way 
down. Lone Walker was the leader of the party. 
He rode up close to our shelf and asked if we had 
seen the enemy while sitting there, and upon 

137 



Rising Wolf 

learning that we had n't, said that Red Crow was 
guiding a big party to attack the Crows from the 
top of the cliff. He then turned to his men and 
told one of them to ride up the coulee, and the 
rest to watch him, in order that the Crows might 
not have the least suspicion that we were aware 
of their presence. 

It was hard for us all to do that, to stare up a 
coulee when we wanted to keep our eyes on the 
cliffs, but we had not to endure it long; we soon 
heard the whoom ! whoom ! whoom ! of guns, and 
turning, saw our men on the top of the rounding 
point of the cliff, and shooting down at three 
men running along the shelf on which was the 
entrance to the cave. They disappeared around 
the bend and I knew that they were making for 
shelter there. But whoom! whoom! went two 
guns back in the recess, and soon one of the men 
came running back. In the meantime some of 
our party had found a way down to the other 
end of the shelf, and now came running along it 
out around the point. As soon as the lone enemy 

138 



Camping on Arrow River 

saw them he stopped short, fired an arrow at 
them that went wild, and then with a quick leap 
threw himself from the shelf. Down, down he 
went, a sickening sight as he whirled through the 
air, and struck the rocks far below. 

''Hai! Hai! Hai! A brave end!" cried Lone 
Walker, and all the party echoed his words, and 
several made a dash across to secure his scalp 
and weapons. Meantime one of our men up on 
the extreme point of the cliff was signaling down 
to us, his signs plain as he stood outlined against 
the clear sky: "They are all wiped out! Dead! 
We meet you at camp!" And at that we all got 
upon our horses and rode home. 

The cliff party, bearing the scalps and plunder 
they had taken from the enemy, arrived in camp 
at the same time we did and were hailed with 
great acclaim. As soon as the greeting was over 
Red Crow handed me one of the fringed and 
painted cylinders that we had discovered in the 
cave. "Take it," he said, "it is yours. See, I 
also have one. We got them all." 

139 



Rising Wolf 

We went to our lodge then with Lone Walker, 
and Red Crow told us how he had guided the big 
party out, stationing a few men down at the 
cave, in the first place, and then leading the 
others out upon the point above the shelf where 
he thought the enemy would be sitting. Upon 
looking over the edge they had found the seven 
Crows lying flat on the rocky projection straight 
below, all intently watching our party across at 
the mouth of the coulee. Four of them had been 
killed where they lay. Two of the three that 
then ran for the cave had been shot down before 
they could reach it. The last man, rather than 
give the Pi-kun-i the honor of killing him, had 
committed suicide by jumping from the cliff. 
"He was a coward! Had I been in his place I 
would have fought to the last; I would have 
tried my best to make others die with me!" Red 
Crow concluded. 

"I like to hear you say that. Fight to the 
last! That is the one thing to do!" Lone Walker 
told him. 

140 



Camping on Arrow River 

With no little eagerness Red Crow and I un- 
laced the round end covers of our Crow war 
cylinders, and drew out the contents, and found 
that we each had a beautiful war suit and eagle 
tail feather war bonnet. The streaming ends of 
the bonnets were feathered all the way, and were 
so long that they would drag at our heels as we 
walked. Then and there a visitor in the lodge 
offered me five horses for my costume. I would 
not have parted with it for any number of horses ; 
I had nine head, all that I could possibly use 
while on the trail. 

We camped on Arrow River all of a week, the 
women busily gathering choke-cherries for winter 
use. Upon bringing them into camp they 
pounded them, pits and all, on flat rocks, and 
set the mass on clean rawhides to dry, and then 
stored it in rawhide pouches. There was never 
enough of it for daily use. In its raw state, or 
stewed, or mixed with finely pounded dry meat 
and marrow grease — pemmican — it was passed 
around as a side dish to a feast. I liked it, and 

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Rising Wolf 

always ate my share, although never without 
some misgivings as to the effect of the sharp and 
indigestible particles of pounded pits in my 
stomach. 

During our stay at this place an old, old 
man named Kip-i-tai-su-yi-kak-i (Old-Woman- 
Stretching-Her-Legs) came into our lodge one 
night, took his bow and quiver case from his 
back, passed it to me and said: "There, my son 
Rising Wolf! I heard that you wanted bow and 
arrows, so I give you this set, one that I took 
long ago in battle with the Snake People. It is a 
good bow. The arrows are well feathered and 
fly straight. I hope that you will have good 
success with my present, and sometimes remem- 
ber that I am fond of broiled tongue!" 

And at that he laughed, and we all laughed 
with him, and I said that he should not lack for 
tongues, and kept my word. I was very glad to 
get the bow. At first it was a little too stiffs for 
the strength of my arms, but with daily use of it 
my muscles grew up to its requirement of 

142 



Camping on Arrow River 

strength, and I soon became a fair shot with the 
feathered shafts. I did not carry the bow all the 
time, but always used it for running buffaloes. 
On my first chase with it I killed three cows, and 
once, several years later, shot down thirteen 
cows with it in one run. But that was nothing. 
I once saw a man, named Little Otter, shoot 
twenty-seven buffaloes in one run! He was a 
big, powerfully built man, he rode a big, swift, 
well-trained, buffalo horse, and every time he let 
an arrow fly it slipped into an animal just back 
of the ribs and ranged forward into the heart and 
lungs. 

You ask how a man happened to be named 
Old-Woman-Stretching-Her-Legs. When a child 
was born, a medicine man was called in to name 
it, and invariably the name he gave was of some- 
thing he had seen, or of some incident, in one of 
his dreams, or, as he believed them to be, visions. 
Thus, in a dream, the medicine man had seen 
an old woman at rest, or sleeping, and she had 
stretched down her legs to get more ease. Hence 

143 



Rising Wolf 

the name. A woman generally retained through 
life the name given her at birth. A man, as I 
have explained, was entitled to take a new name 
every time he counted a big coup. Some odd 
names that I remember are Chewing-Black- 
Bones ; Back-Coming-in-Sight ; Tail-Feathers- 
Coming-in-Sight-over-the-Hill; Falling Bear; and 
He-Talked-with-the-Buffalo. 

During the time of our encampment on Arrow 
River, Red Crow and I killed a number of fine 
bighorn rams along the cliffs, and the skins of 
these, tanned into soft leather and smoked by 
the women, were made into a shirt and leggings 
for me. It was time that I had them, for my 
one suit of company clothes was falling to pieces. 
Also, my shoes had given out. Attired now in 
leather clothes, breechclout, moccasins, and with 
a toga, or wrap of buffalo cow leather, I was all 
Indian except in color. Lone Walker himself 
made the suit for me. Men were their own tail- 
ors; the women made only their moccasins. In 
time I learned to cut out and sew my clothing. 

144 



Camping on Arrow River 

Red Crow had become the owner of one of the 
two huge Spanish bits that we had found in the 
cave with the rest of the Crow belongings. It 
was beautifully fashioned of hand-forged steel, 
its long shanks inlaid with silver, and he took 
good care of it, polishing and cleaning it fre- 
quently. As he was thus occupied one evening, 
Lone Walker pointed to the bit and asked me if 
I knew whence it had come. I did n't, of course, 
and said so, whereupon he told Mink Woman to 
take down a long, well-wrapped roll of buckskin 
that was invariably fastened to the lodge poles 
above his couch. I had often wondered what it 
might contain. He undid the fastenings, un- 
rolled wrap after wrap of leather, and held up to 
my astonished gaze a shirt of mail, very fine 
meshed and light, and an exquisitely fashioned 
rapier. He passed them to me for examination, 
and I found etched on the rapier blade the legend: 
" Francisco Alvarez. Barcelona. 1693." It was 
an old Spanish blade. 

"The people who made the bit," he told me in 
14s 



Rising Wolf 

signs and words, very slowly and carefully so 
that I would understand, "made these. They 
live in the Far Southland ; the always-summer 
land. I went there once with a party of our 
people, traveling ever south all summer. We 
started from our country when the grass first 
started in the spring, and, counting the moons, 
arrived in that far Southland in the first moon of 
winter here. We found there white men differ- 
ent from those who had come to the Assiniboine 
River and built a fort. They were dark-skinned 
and black-haired, most of them. They had many 
horses. We went south to take their horses, and 
captured many of them. But not without a 
fight, several fights. In one of the fights I killed 
the man who wore this iron shirt and carried this 
big knife. We did not get back to our country 
until the middle of the next summer. That is a 
strong shirt. Arrows cannot pierce it. It has 
saved my life three different times in battle with 
the enemy." 
Well, that was news to me, that these people 
146 



Camping on Arrow River 

went so very far, all the way to Mexico, on their 
raids. Afterward I heard many interesting tales 
of raids into the Far South, many parties going 
there in my time, and generally returning with 
great bands of horses and plunder taken from 
the Spanish, and from different Indian tribes. I 
learned that the Crows had the first horses that 
the Blackfeet tribes ever saw, and that they were 
almost paralyzed with astonishment when they 
saw men mount the strange, big animals and 
guide them in whatever direction they wished to 
go. But fear soon gave place to burning desire 
to own the useful animals, and they began raid- 
ing the herds of the Crows, the Snakes, and 
other Southern tribes, and the Spanish, and in 
time became owners of thousands of them 
through capture, and by natural increase. Lone 
Walker told me that his people first obtained 
horses when his father's father was a small boy, 
and as near as I could figure it, that was about 
1680 to 1700. The acquisition of the horse 
caused a vast change in the life of the Blackfeet 

147 



Rising Wolf 

tribes. Before that time, with only their wolf- 
Hke dogs for beasts of burden, their wanderings 
had been Hmited to the forests of the Slave 
Lakes region, and the edge of the plains of the 
Saskatchewan. With horses for riding and pack- 
ing, and, later, a few guns obtained from the 
Sieur de la Verendrie's company, they swept 
southward and conquered a vast domain and 
became the terror of all surrounding tribes. 
The Blackfeet named the horse, po-no-ka-mi-ta 
(elk-dog), because, like the dog, it carried bur- 
dens, and was of large size, like the elk. 

One evening, there at Arrow River, Lone 
Walker told me that we would ride out early 
the next morning, and he would show me a 
"white men's leavings," — nap-i-kwaks o-kit- 
stuks-in, in his language. I asked him what it 
was, and was told to be patient; that I should 
see it. Accordingly, we rode out on the plain on 
the trail by which we had come down to the 
river, then turned sharply to the right, following 
the general course of the big, walled valley, and 

148 



Camping on Arrow River 

after several hours' travel came to a pile of rocks 
set on top of a low ridge on the plain, and at the 
head of a very long coulee, heading there and 
running down to the river, several miles away. 
"There! That is white men's leavings!" the 
chief exclaimed. "We know not how long ago 
they piled those rocks. It was in my father's 
time that our people found the pile, just as you 
see it, except that at that time a white metal 
figure of a man against black, crossed sticks, his 
arms outstretched, was stuck in the top of it, so 
that it faced yonder Belt Mountains." 

I was tremendously interested. "What be- 
came of the man figure?" I asked. 

"The finder kept it for some time, and then 
sacrificed it to the sun; hung it to the roof of a 
medicine lodge," he answered, and it seemed 
strange to think that an image of Jesus had been 
presented to a pagan god. 

"How long ago do you think it was that white 
men put up this pile?" I asked. 

" Fifty, maybe sixty, maybe seventy winters. 
149 



Rising Wolf 

In my father's time white men came to the 
camp of the Earth House People. It was in 
winter time. They rode horses ; wore iron shirts ; 
carried guns with big, flaring muzzles, and long 
knives. From the camp of the Earth House 
People they went west, returned soon, and went 
back north, whence they had come. None of our 
tribes saw them." 

I said to myself: '"The Sieur de la Veren- 
drie's party must have put up this monument, 
and yonder Belt Mountains must be those that 
they named the Shining Mountains!" 

Well I knew the story of the brave and un- 
fortunate Sieur. My grandfather, who had had 
some interest in his ventures, had related it 
many times. Because of enemies who had the 
favor of the Court, in France, he had failed in 
his undertakings to establish a great fur trade 
in the West, and he had died of a broken heart ! 
I must confess that I felt some disappointment 
upon learning that I was not, as I had thought, 
the first of my race to see this part of the coun- 

150 



Camping on Arrow River 

try. However, the knowledge that I had been 
the first white person to traverse the great Sas- 
katchewan-Missouri River country comforted 
me. 

As we rode homeward I learned from Lone 
Walker that a man named Sees Far had dis- 
covered the monument and taken the cross. He 
was long since dead. I was afraid to ask where 
the medicine lodge was built at which the cross 
had been sacrificed to the sun. The penalty for 
robbing the sun was death. The Blackfeet 
tribes had too much reverence for their gods to 
do that, and war parties of other tribes, traveling 
through the country and coming upon a deserted 
medicine lodge, gave it a wide berth; they 
feared the power of the shining god for whom it 
had been built. I remember that the Kai-na 
tribe of the Blackfeet once came upon three free 
trappers (or were they the American Company's 
engages — I forget) robbing a medicine lodge, and 
killed them all! 

I come now to a part of my story that is not 



Rising Wolf 

SO very happy. On the morning that we broke 
the Arrow River camp, the chiefs, and the guard 
that generally rode ahead of the column, re- 
mained on the camp ground, gathered here and 
there in little groups smoking and telling stories, 
until long after the people had packed up and 
were traveling up the long coulee through which 
the trail led to the plain on the south side of the 
valley. I went on with Red Crow and Mink 
Woman, and a young man named Eagle Plume, 
Lone Walker's nephew, helping them herd along 
the chief's big band of horses in which, of course, 
were those that he had given me. As soon as we 
got out of the narrow confine of the coulee we 
drove the herd at one side of the beaten travois 
and pack trail, keeping about even with Lone 
Walker's outfit of women and children riders, and 
their loaded horses. Their place was at the head 
of the Little Robes Band, and that had its place 
in the long line about a half mile from the lead 
band, which was that of the Lone Eaters. 

We had traveled three or four miles from the 
IS? 



Camping on Arrow River 

river, and were wending our way among a wide, 
long setting of rough hills, keeping ever in the 
low places between them, when, without the 
slightest warning, a large body of riders dashed 
out from behind a steep hill and made for the 
head of our column. Far off as they were, we 
could hear them raise their war song, and could 
see that they were all decked out in their war 
finery. 

''Crows! Crows! They attack us!" I heard 
men crying as they urged their horses forward. 

"Crows! We must help fight them!" Red 
Crow called to me, and like one in a dream I 
found myself with my companions riding madly 
for the front. 



CHAPTER VII 

THE CROWS ATTACK THE BLACKFEET 

A LL the men from the whole length of the 
JlJl line were rushing forward, even the old 
and weak who had scarce strength enough to 
string their bows. Ahead, women and children 
were coming back as fast as they could make 
their horses run, and pack horses, travois horses, 
and those dragging lodge poles were running 
in all directions and scattering their loads upon 
the plain. It was a scene of awful confusion 
and of noise; women and children yelling and 
crying with fright, flying past us wild eyed, our 
men shouting to one another to hurry, to take 
courage, and above all, louder than all, the yells 
and shouts of the enemy and our few warriors 
there at the front. 

The Crows were forcing our men back; they 
were fighting their best but were far outnum- 
bered and, as we could see, were falling not a few. 

IS4 



The Crows' Attack the Blackfeetl 

I looked back, and the sight of hundreds of our 
men coming on was encouraging. With my com- 
panions, and twenty or thirty more riders, I was 
now getting close to the fighting. The Crows, in 
one big, long body, were riding full speed 
across the stand our men were making, shooting 
their arrows and few guns as they passed, and 
wheeling out and around for another charge by 
them. This they had done many times, and so 
far as I could see, but few of them had fallen. 

At last we were at the front, arriving there just 
as the Crows were making another of their wheel- 
ing charges. They must have been all of four 
hundred men, and we there facing them were not 
two hundred. On they came, to pass close on 
our right, shouting their war cry, their long- 
tailed war bonnets, the fringe of their beautiful 
clothes, the plumes of their shields all a-flutter 
in the wind. A brave sight they were, and fear- 
some! As they swept past us they shot their 
arrows, the air was full of them, and we shot at 
them. Several men on both sides went down, 

iSS 



Rising Wolf 

horses were wounded and became unmanageable 
in their fright, carrying their riders whither 
they willed. My horse was dancing with excite- 
ment and jerking on his bit, making it impossible 
for me to take steady aim, so I fired my gun at 
the thickest group of the passing riders and so 
far as I could see did them no harm. 

This time, instead of wheeling out and around 
for another charge, the Crow chief led his men 
straight on along the line of the fleeing women 
and children. Swarms of our men were coming 
out, and he no doubt concluded to do all the 
damage that he could before he would have to 
give way before our superior numbers. Upon 
seeing his intent, we, too, turned back, the men 
crying out to one another: " The women! The 
children ! Fight hard for them ! " 

Out where the Crows had first struck our col- 
umn there were dead and dying and wounded 
women and children, as well as men, and now 
more began to fall. The Crows were without 
mercy. Here were the people who had despoiled 

iS6 



The Grows Attack the Blackfeet 

them; taken from them their vast hunting- 
ground; and now they should pay for it with 
, their blood! They were so drunk with hatred 
that they were for the time reckless of harm to 
themselves. 

We followed them close. Beyond, a great 
crowd of our men were riding at them, led by 
Lone Walker himself. I did not see what he did, 
I had eyes only for what was immediately around 
me, but I heard the tale of it many times after- 
ward. He made straight for the Crow chief, and 
the latter for him, and they brought their horses 
together with such a shock that both fell. As 
they went down both men sprang free and grap- 
pled one another. Lone Walker dropping his 
empty gun, and the Crow letting go his bow and 
handful of arrows. A crowd surrounded them, 
the Crows endeavoring to aid their chief, our 
men fighting them off. The Crow chief had 
managed to get out his knife, but Lone Walker 
gave his arm such a sudden fierce twist that he 
dropped it, endeavored to recover it, and as he 

IS7 



Rising Wolf 

did so Lone Walker got out his own knife and 
stabbed him down through his back into his 
heart, and he fell and died ! 

In the meantime we were in a terrible scrim- 
mage; a thick mixup of riders. I had stuck my 
gun in under my belt, there was no time to reload 
it, and had fired one of my pistols, and now got 
out the other one. Red Crow and I were side 
by side. He had shot away his handful of arrows 
and was reaching into his quiver for more when 
a Crow rode up beside him, reached out and 
grasped him by the arm, endeavoring to pull 
him over and knife him. I saw him just in time 
to poke my pistol over past Red Crow and fire, 
and down he went from his horse ! The sight of 
him falling, his awful stare of hate — would you 
believe it, made me sick and sorry for him, 
enemy though he was! '*I have killed a man! I 
have killed a man!" I said to myself as I re- 
placed the pistol and got out my gun to use as a 
club, as I saw others doing. But just then I saw 
a wounded woman stagger to her feet, and then 

158 



The Grows Attack the Blackfeet 

with a cry throw up her hands and fall dead, and 
I shouted with joy that I had killed, and with 
Red Crow dashed on, thirsting now to kill ! kill ! 
kill! Right there, and for all time vanished my 
doubts, my tender-heartedness! The enemies of 
the Pi-kun-i were my enemies so long as they 
tried to do me harm ! 

Their chief dead, and faced by ever-increasing 
numbers of our warriors, the Crows now turned 
and fled, but we did not chase them far; our men 
were so anxious about their families, to learn if 
they were safe, or dead, that they had no heart 
for the pursuit. It was a terrible sight that met 
our eyes as we turned and went back to that part 
of the trail that had been the scene of the fight ; 
everywhere along it were dead and wounded 
men and women and children and horses. I 
could not bear to look at them, and was glad 
when Lone Walker told a number of us to round 
up the pack and travois horses scattered out 
upon the plain, and drive them back to the river, 
where we would go into camp and bury the dead. 

IS9 



Rising Wolf 

We were a long time doing that, necessarily 
leaving the packs that had fallen for the owners 
to recover later. When we got back to the river 
with our drive we found many lodges already 
up, including our two. None of Lone Walker's 
great family had been harmed, nor had they met 
any loss of property. Red Crow and I got a 
hasty bite to eat, and catching fresh horses went 
with a strong guard that was to remain out on 
the plain until all the dead had been carried in 
for burial, and all the scattered property re- 
covered. That was all done before sunset, and 
then a guard was placed about camp for the 
night, and another told ofif to herd the horses. 

That was a sad evening. Everywhere in camp 
there was wailing for the dead; everywhere 
medicine men were praying for the wounded, 
chanting their sacred songs as they went through 
strange ceremonies for curing thera. The chiefs 
gathered in our lodge to bitterly blame them- 
selves for not having been out at the front, with 
the guard ahead of them, when camp was broken. 

i6o 



The Grows Attack the Blackfeet 

They had taken count of our loss: forty-one 
men, thirty-two women and girls, and nine chil- 
dren were dead and buried — the trees in the 
near grove were full of them — and some of the 
wounded were sure to die. The Crows had lost 
sixty-one of their number, and some of their 
wounded would undoubtedly die. Not then, nor 
for many a night afterward, did any one tell what 
he had particularly done in the fight against the 
enemy. It was surmised that, in wiping out the 
seven Crows on the cliff, another member of the 
party, perhaps on watch elsewhere, had been 
overlooked; and that he had gone home and 
brought his people to attack us. There were two 
tribes of the enemy: the River Crows and the 
Mountain Crows. If camping together, they 
were too strong for the Pi-kun-i to attack. That 
very evening three messengers were selected to 
go north to the Kai-na, camping somewhere in 
the Bear Paw Mountains, and ask them to come 
down and join in a raid against the enemy. 
I pass over the ensuing days of sadness, in 
i6i 



Rising Wolf 

which seven of the wounded died. As soon as 
the others were well enough to travel we moved 
on, camped one night on 0-to-kwi-tuk-tai, Yel- 
low River, or as Lewis and Clark named it, 
Judith River, and the next day moved east to a 
small stream named It-tsis-ki-os-op ( It-Crushed- 
Them). Years later it was named ArmelFs Creek 
after an American Fur Company man who built 
a trading post at its junction with the Missouri. 
The Blackfoot name was given it for the reason 
that some women, when digging red paint in the 
foot of a high cutbank bordering the stream, 
had been killed by a heavy fall of the earth. 

The stream rises in the midst of some high, 
flat-topped buttes crowned with a sparse growth 
of scrub pine and juniper, and its valley is well 
timbered with pine and cottonwood. Its head 
is only a few miles from the foot of the Mut-si- 
kin-is-tuk-ists (Moccasin Mountains). On the 
morning after we went into camp I rode out to 
hunt with Red Crow, and he took me to the 
extreme head of the stream, which was a large 

162 



The Grows Attack the Blackfeet 

spring under an overhang of wall rock. This 
sloped up from the sands of the floor on the right 
of the spring to a height of six or seven feet on 
the outside of the spring, and was of dark brown 
volcanic rock. Originally very rough, as the 
extreme outer and inner portion attested, this 
roof had in the course of ages been rubbed smooth 
by the animals that had come there to drink at 
the spring. All that had come, from small ante- 
lopes to huge buffaloes, had found the right 
height of it against which to rub their backs, and 
they had rubbed and rubbed until the whole 
roof as high as they could touch it was as smooth 
and lustrous as glass. I could see my face in it. 

While standing there we heard some animals 
coming along one of the many trails in the sur- 
rounding timber, and presently saw that they 
were a file of bull elk. We had left our horses 
some distance back, so they saw nothing to 
alarm them. When they were within thirty feet 
of us Red Crow let fly an arrow at the leader, 
and the others stopped and stared at him as he 

163 



Rising Wolf 

fell, and struggled fruitlessly to regain his feet. 
That gave my companion time to slip an arrow 
into another one, and then I fired and dropped a 
third, and we had all the meat that we wanted. 
We butchered the three, and then went home and 
sent Lone Walker's nephew and some of the 
women out with pack horses for the meat. 

From the time that the Crows made their 
terrible attack upon us, we kept a strong guard 
with the horses night and day, and kept scouting 
parties far out on the plains watching for the 
possible return of the enemy. Some men who 
had been sent to trail the Crows to their camp, 
returned in eight or nine days' time and reported 
that it was onThe-Other-Side Bear River (0-pum- 
ohst Kyai-is-i-sak-ta), straight south from the 
pass in the Moccasin Mountains. This is the 
Musselshell River of Lewis and Clark. The 
Blackfoot name for it distinguishes it from their 
other Bear River, the Marias. 

The returning scouts said that the camp was 
very large, and in two parts, showing that both 

164 



The Grows Attack the Blackfeet 

tribes of the Crows were there. Said Lone 
Walker when he got the news: "And so they 
have dared to come back into our land and hunt 
our game ! Ha ! As soon as the Kai-na come we 
shall make them pay dearly for that!" 

The talk now was all of war. In every tree 
about the camp were hung the warriors' offerings 
to the sun, placed there with prayers to the god 
to give them success in the coming battle. 

As I have said, the camp was always pitched 
in a big circle of the clan groups. Inside this 
circle were nine lodges set in a smaller circle, 
each one painted with a sacred, or "medicine" 
design, no two of them alike. The one always 
set nearest to our Small Robes group of lodges 
was owned by a great warrior named Mi-nik-sa- 
pwo-pi (Mad Plume), and had for its design a 
huge buffalo bull and a buffalo cow in black, the 
heart, and the life line running to it from the 
mouth, painted bright red. I had not thought 
that these lodges had any especial significance, 
but I was soon to know better. On the day after 

I6S 



Rising Wolf 

we killed the elk at the shining rock spring, Red 
Crow pointed to the buffalo medicine lodge and 
said to me: "Just think; we are invited there 
to-night! We are asked to join the Braves!" 

"He does not understand," said Lone Walker, 
standing near us. "Let us sit here, White Son, 
and I will explain." 

We sat there in front of our lodge, and the 
chief began: "Those nine are the lodges of the 
chiefs of the All Friends Society. It has nine 
different bands: the Braves, All-Crazy-Dogs, 
Raven Carriers, Dogs, Tails, Horns, Kit-Foxes, 
Siezers, and Bulls. To become a member of one 
of the bands one has to be of good heart, of a 
straight tongue, generous, and of proved brav- 
ery; so you see that you are thought to be all 
that, else you would not be asked to join this 
band of Braves, made up of our young warriors. 
I am a member of the Bulls, our oldest warriors. 
All the bands are under the orders of myself 
and my brother clan chiefs. There! Now you 
understand!" 

i66 



The Crows Attack the Blackfeet 

But I did n't. I learned in time, however, that 
this great I-kun-uh-kat-si, or All Friends Society, 
had for its main object the carrying out — under 
the direction of the chiefs — of the tribal laws. If 
a man or woman was to be punished, it was a 
band of the society that meted it out, after the 
chiefs decided what the punishment should be. 
In battle the members of a band hung close 
together, shouting the name of it, and encourag- 
ing one another to do their best. Each band had 
its particular songs, and its own peculiar way of 
dancing. Its chief's lodge was its headquarters, 
and there of an evening the members were wont 
to gather for a social time, for a little feast, sing- 
ing, and story telling as the pipe went round the 
circle. 

i When Red Crow and I went into the Braves' 
lodge that evening, Mad Plume made us welcome, 
and indicated that we should sit at his left. That 
was the only space left; all the rest was occupied 
by his family, and members of the band, who 
also gave us pleasant greeting. 

167 



Rising Wolf 

"Now, then, young men," Mad Plume said 
to us as soon as we were seated, "we have had 
our eyes upon you for some time, thinking to 
invite you to join us. We learned that you are 
good-hearted, generous, truthful, that you are 
good to the old. We but waited to learn what 
you would do before the enemy, and we learned ; 
the other day when the Crows attacked us you 
each did your best; you each did your share in 
driving them off, and each killed. So now we 
ask: Would you like to become Braves?" 

"Yes! Yes!" we exclaimed. 

"And will you always obey the orders of the 
tribes' chiefs, and the Braves' chief?'' 

"Yes! Yes!" 

"Then you are Braves!" he concluded. And 
all present signified their approval. I can't begin 
to tell you how pleased I was, how proud of this 
unexpected honor. And at last I felt absolutely 
safe with the Pi-kun-i ; felt that they considered 
me one of them in every respect. 

There were countless herds of game in all 
i68 



The Grows Attack the Blackfeet 

directions from our camp there on It-Crushed- 
Them. By day the hunters scattered it, but it 
was the mating season of the buffaloes, they 
were very uneasy, constantly on the move, and 
fresh herds took the place of those that were 
frightened away. One day when Red Crow and 
I were out after meat, with Mink Woman trail- 
ing us with a couple of pack horses, we saw a 
small band of buffaloes lying on a side hill, and 
leaving our horses in the shelter of the timber 
around the shining rock spring, approached 
them. We followed up a shallow coulee that 
headed close to the resting animals, in places 
crawling upon hands and knees in order to keep 
under the shelter of low banks. Mink Woman 
followed us close. We had asked her to remain 
with the horses, but she was determined to be 
right with us and see the shooting at close range. 
We were still several hundred yards from the 
buffaloes, much too far for Red Crow's arrows, 
and even my gun, when we heard the moaning 
bellow of bulls off to our left. We paid no atten- 

169 



Rising Wolf 

tion to it; there had been no buffaloes in sight 
in that direction, and we thought that the ani- 
mals making it were a long way off. That deep, 
muffled bellowing, however, was wonderfully 
deceiving; just by the sound of it, without look- 
ing, one could never determine if the animals 
making it were near by, or a mile or so away. 
But now we were suddenly warned that the bulls 
we heard were close; we could hear the rushing 
thud of their feet, and two appeared just a few 
yards ahead of us, attacking one another on the 
edge of the coulee and slipping sideways down 
the steep bank, head pressed against head. 

"They are mad! Don't shoot, don't move, 
else they may attack us!" Red Crow told me, 
and Mink Woman, just back of us, heard him. 

But they were not all; only two of a band of 
thirty or forty, all bulls, all outcasts from differ- 
ent herds, mad at one another and at all the 
world. The two fighting incited others to fight, 
and the rest, moaning and tossing their heads, 
switching their short tails, were soon all around 

170 



The Grows Attack the Blackfeet 

us. They presented a most frightful spectacle! 
Their dark eyes seemed to shoot fire from under 
the overhanging shaggy hair; several more en- 
gaged in fights, and some of those afraid to do 
that attacked the bank of the coulee and with 
their sharp horns gouged out pieces of turf and 
tossed them in every direction. We dared not 
move; we hardly dared breathe; our suspense 
was almost unbearable. Said Mink Woman at 
last: "Brother, I am terribly frightened. I 
think that I shall have to run!" 

" Don't you do it ! No running unless we are 
about to be stepped upon!" he answered. An 
old bull standing not twenty feet from us heard 
the low talk, whirled around and stared at us. 
Anyhow I thought that it was at us, but if it 
was, he likely did not distinguish us from the 
rocks and sage brush among which we were 
lying. If he charged us I intended to shoot him 
in the brain, and then we should have to take our 
chances running from the others. But just then 
a bellowing started off where the band was that 

171 



Rising Wolf 

we had been approaching, and he turned and 
went leaping out of the coulee toward it, others 
following, leaving but two sets fighting in front 
of us. At that Mink Woman, no longer able to 
stand the strain, sprang to her feet and ran down 
the coulee, we then following her and looking 
back to see if we were pursued. ^ The fighters 
paid no attention to us, but we kept running and 
never stopped until we reached our horses. Then, 
looking up the hill, we saw that the bulls had 
mingled with the band that we had been after, 
and all were traveling off to the south. 

"Hai! We have had a narrow escape!" Red 
Crow exclaimed, and went on to tell me that 
outcast bulls were very dangerous. The hunters 
never tried to approach them on foot, and gen- 
erally kept well away from them even when well 
mounted. Mink Woman listened, still shaking a 
little from the fright she had had, and then told 
me that only the summer before a mad bull had 
attacked a woman near camp and pierced her 
through the back with one of his horns, upon 

172 



The Crows Attack the Blackfeet 

which she hung suspended despite his efforts to 
shake her off. Becoming frightened then, and 
bhnded by her wrap, he had rushed right into 
camp and into a lodge, upsetting it and tramp- 
Hng its contents until killed by the men. He fell 
with the woman still impaled upon his horn. 
She was dead ! 

As we mounted and rode on, Red Crow told 
other instances of people being killed by outcast 
bulls. He said that bulls with a herd were not 
bad; that the cows would always run from the 
hunter, and they with them. We proved that in 
less than an hour, for we again approached the 
band that had been on the hillside, the outcast 
bulls now with it, and in a short run killed 
three cows, the bulls sprinting their best to out- 
run our horses. 

Except for playing children and quarreling 
dogs, ours was a very quiet camp those days 
there on It-Crushed-Them. The people still 
mourned for their dead and, for that matter, did 
so for a year or more. Those not mourning had 

173 



Rising Wolf 

no heart for social pleasure. All waited im- 
patiently for the coming of the Kai-na. Day 
after day the medicine men got out their sacred 
pipes and smoked and prayed to the gods to give 
the warriors great success against the Crows, 
still encamped upon The-Other-Side Bear River, 
as the scouts kept reporting. I wondered if the 
Crows had scouts out keeping equally close watch 
upon our camp. 

One morning Lone Walker sent Red Crow and 
me to the Black Butte, the extreme eastern end 
of the Moccasin Mountains, with dried meat and 
back fat for the four scouts stationed there. We 
started very early, arrived at the foot of the 
butte by something like ten o'clock, and there 
left our horses in a grove of cottonwoods, and 
began the ascent with our packs of meat. It 
was a long, steep, winding climb up around to its 
southern slope, and thence to its summit, and 
we did not attain it until mid-afternoon. We 
found two of the watchers asleep in a little en- 
closure of rocks just under the summit, and the 

174 



The Crows Attack the Blackfeet 

two others sitting upon the highest point. They 
had seen us approaching the butte on our horses, 
and were expecting us. They had no word for 
us to take back; no enemies had appeared, the 
country seemed to be free from them. 

It was from this high point that I got my first 
good view of the Bear Paw, and Wolf Mountains, 
across on the north side of the Missouri, and the 
great plains of the Missouri-Musselshell country. 
The plains were black with buffaloes as far out in 
all directions as the eye could distinguish them. 
I cannot begin to tell you how glad I was to be 
there on that high point looking out upon that 
vast buffalo plain, its grand mountains, its senti- 
nel buttes, and deep-gashed river valleys. I had 
a sense of ownership in it all. White though my 
skin, and blue my eyes, I was a member of a 
Blackfoot tribe, yes, even a member of its law 
and order society. And so, in common with my 
red people, an owner of this great hunting- 
ground ! 

And even as I was thinking that. Red Crow 
I7S 



Rising Wolf 

turned from a long lookout upon it and said to 
me : " Rising Wolf, brother, what a rich, what a 
beautiful land is ours!" 

No, that doesn't express it; he said, "Ki-sak- 
ow-an-on ! " (Your land and ours !) 

"Ai! That is truth!" I answered, and we 
hastened down the steep butte, mounted our 
horses and went homeward across the plain. 

We arrived in camp to find the messengers re- 
turned from the north. With them had come 
several hundred warriors of the Kai-na, and the 
whole tribe would be with us on the following 
day. For the first time since the fight with the 
Crows our camp livened up; feasts were pre- 
pared in many lodges for our guests, and later 
in the evening several bands of the All Friends 
Society gave dances in which they joined. For 
the first time, I put on my Crow war suit and 
joined in the dance of the Braves. As I had 
been practicing the step all by myself in the 
brush, I did quite well, and even got some 
praise. 

176 



The Crows Attack the Blackfeet 

The Kai-na trailed in and set up their lodges 
just below us the next afternoon. I counted the 
lodges and found that there were eleven hundred 
and thirty, including twenty-five or thirty lodges 
of Gros Ventres. All together we were a camp ( 
of nearly three thousand lodges — about fifteen 
thousand people. I looked out at the horses 
grazing upon the plain; there was no estimating 
the number; there were thousands and thou- 
sands of them ! 

That evening Eagle Ribs, head chief of the 
Kai-na, came with his clan chiefs to our lodge to 
council with Lone Walker and his clan chiefs. 
They all used such big words to express what 
they had to say that I would never have known 
what the talk was about had they not also used 
signs, these for the benefit of the Gros Ventre 
clan chief, who did not understand the Blackfoot 
language anywhere near as well as I did. The 
council lasted far into the night. When it broke 
up the decision was that we were to break camp 
early in the morning, travel all day on the trail 

177 



Rising Wolf 

to the Crow camp, and on the following morning 
go on, the warriors as fast as possible, the rest 
at the usual pace. It was the general opinion 
that we could strike the Crow camp early in the 
afternoon of the second day. 



CHAPTER VIII 

IN THE YELLOW RIVER COUNTRY 

ON the following evening we camped upon a 
small stream flowing into the Musselshell 
through a wide valley lying between the Moc- 
casin Mountains, and another outlying shoot 
from the Rockies, named Kwun-is-tuk-ists (Snow 
Mountains). Not so named because they were 
more snowy than other mountains, but for their 
white rock formation. From a distance large 
bare areas of this on the dark, timbered slopes 
have all the appearance of snow banks. 

The two great camps of us were certainly 
lively enough that evening. In the early part of 
it there was much dancing and feasting, many 
gatherings in the lodges of the medicine men for 
prayers, and sacrifices for success on the morrow, 
and later on the men laid out their war suits and 
war bonnets ready to put on in the morning. A 
big fire was lighted soon after dark to call in the 

179 



Rising Wolf 

watchers from the high points along the Moc- 
casins, and the Snow Mountains, all of them 
excepting those upon the trail in the gap of the 
latter, from which they kept watch upon the 
camp of the enemy. 

Late in the evening, nearly midnight it was, 
one of these last came in and told Lone Walker 
that the Crows seemed to be unaware of our 
approach, and at sundown their camp must still 
have been in the river valley, for they had not 
been seen trailing out from there. During the 
day movements of the buffaloes had shown that 
their hunters had been out from both sides of 
the valley for meat. 

On the following morning we were all up before 
daylight, eating hurried meals that the women set 
before us, looking over our weapons, and anxious 
to be on our way. And the women were just as 
anxious that we start, for they wanted to pack 
up and follow as fast as they could ; they were 
expecting to become rich with Crow property 
that day. Soon after daylight we mounted our 

i8o 



In the Yellow River Country 

best horses and were off, the Pi-kun-i and Kai-na 
chiefs, and the Ut-se-na, or Gros Ventre, chief 
with them in the lead, we following, band after 
band of the All Friends Society. All the Black- 
feet tribes had this Society. 

At mid-forenoon, when we topped the pass in 
the Snow Mountains, we found there our watch- 
ers awaiting us with somewhat disturbing news; 
they had not that morning seen any movement 
of the Crows out on the plain from their camp. 
Other mornings they had appeared on the plains 
on both sides of the river, rounding up their 
horses, riding out to hunt. 

"Maybe they have discovered what we are 
up to, and have struck out for their country off 
there across Elk River," Lone Walker said to 
Eagle Ribs. 

"Ai! One of their war parties may have seen 
us. If they did, they had plenty of time to get in 
with the news; we did not travel fast," said the 
Kai-na chief. 

"Well, let us hurry on!" Lone Walker cried, 
i8i 



Rising Wolf 

and away we went down the pass and out upon 
the plain. 

"It is just as I thought," I said to myself. 
"If we could keep a watch upon their camp, they 
could upon ours. They saw the Kai-na joining 
us, and have fled ! " 

It was a long way from the foot of the moun- 
tains out across the plain to the river; all of 
twenty miles, I should say. We made the length 
of it at a killing pace, and when, at last, we 
arrived at the rim of the valley our horses were 
covered with sweat, gasping for breath and 
about done for. Here and there in the big, long 
bottom under us a number of scattered lodges 
and hundreds of standing pole sets, told of the 
hurried flight of the Crows. We went down to 
the camp and examined it, and learned by raking 
out the fireplaces that it had been abandoned the 
previous evening. In the hurry of their going, 
they had left about all of their heavy property, 
all of their lodge pole sets, many lodges complete, 
and no end of parfleches and pack pouches filled 

182 



In the Yellow River Country 

with dried meat and tongues, pemmican, and 
dried berries. There was also much other stuff 
scattered about: rolls of leather; tanned and 
partly tanned buffalo robes for winter use; 
moccasins, used, and new, and beautifully em- 
broidered ; and many pack saddles and ropes. 

"Well, brothers, all this will make our women 
happy," said Eagle Ribs, with a wave of his hand 
around. 

"Ai! Some of them. It will not lighten the 
hearts of those who mourn!" said Lone Walker. 

"And we cannot now lighten them! The 
Crows have a night's start of us, and our horses 
are so tired that we cannot overtake them," said 
Mad Plume. 

"Before night they will cross Elk River and 
fortify themselves so strongly in timber, or on 
hill, that it will be impossible for us to carry the 
position!" another exclaimed. 

All the chiefs agreed to that, and then Lone 
Walker said: "All that we can do is to keep 
parties out after their horses as long as we re- 

183 



Rising Wolf 

main in this south part of our country. That, 
and the great loss of their property here, will 
teach them to remain upon their own hunting- 
ground." 

The whole party then dismounted, some 
gathering in groups for a smoke, others scatter- 
ing out to wander in the deserted camp and 
gather up for their women whatever took their 
fancy. Red Crow and I rode to the upper camp 
and had great fun going from lodge to lodge and 
examining the heaps of stuff that the Crows had 
abandoned. My quest was for fur, and I col- 
lected nine beaver and two otter skins. 

That evening the chiefs held another council. 
Some were for giving the Crows time to get over 
their scare, and then going down into their 
country — all the warriors of both our tribes, and 
taking them by surprise and wiping them out. 
Lone Walker said that to do that we would have 
to lose a great many men; that he thought his 
plan, to keep them poor in horses, was the best. 
Finally, I was asked to give my opinion on the 

184 



In the Yellow River Country 

matter. I had been thinking a lot about it, and 
in signs, and with what words I could command, 
spoke right out: 

"When I saw the women killed by the Crows, 
I was so angry that I wanted to help you fight 
until all the Crows were dead, but I do not feel 
so now," I told them. "You have done great 
wrongs to the Crows; back there on Arrow River 
they did only what you have done to them. 
Here is a great, rich country, large enough for 
all. I would like to see you make peace with the 
Crows, they agreeing to remain on their side of 
Elk River, and you on your side of it." 

"Ha! Your white son has a gentle heart!" 
a Kai-na chief told Lone Walker. 

"If you mean that he has an afraid heart, you 
are mistaken. In the fight the other day, he 
killed an enemy who was about to kill my son. 
Red Crow," Lone Walker answered, and at that 
the chief clapped a hand to his mouth in surprise 
and approval, and his manner quickly changed 
to one of great friendliness to me. 

I8S 



Rising Wolf 

Said Lone Walker to me then: "My son, 
what you propose cannot be done. We have 
twice made peace with the Crows, the last time 
right here on this river, and both times they 
broke it within a moon. It was five summers 
back that we made the last peace with them. 
It was agreed that we should remain on the north 
side of Elk River, they on the south side, and 
neither tribe should raid the other's horse herds. 
The two tribes of us camped here side by side 
for many days, making friends with one another. 
We gave feasts for the Crows, they gave feasts 
for us. Every day there was a big dance in their 
camp, or in ours. A young Crow and one of our 
girls fell in love with one another, and we let 
him have her. Well, at last we parted from the 
Crows and started north, and had gone no farther 
than Yellow River when one of their war parties, 
following us, fell upon some of our hunters and 
killed four, one escaping wounded. So you see 
how it is : the Crows will not keep their word ; it 
is useless to make peace with them." 

i86 



In the Yellow River Country 

On the next evening a mixed party of our and 
Kai-na warriors, about a hundred men, set out 
on foot to raid the Crow horse herds. They were 
going to take no chances; their plan was to 
travel nights, to find the Crows and watch for 
an opportunity to run off a large number of their 
stock. 

The two tribes of us were too many people to 
camp together, so many hunters scattering the 
game, so that after a few days we were obliged 
to go a long way from camp to get meat. An- 
other council was held and the chiefs decided 
that we, the Pi-kun-i, should winter in the upper 
Yellow River country, and the Kai-na on the 
Missouri, between the mouth of Yellow River 
and the mouth of the stream upon which we were 
then camping. Two days later we broke camp 
and went our way. 

We struck Yellow River higher up than where 
we had crossed it coming out, and went into 
camp in a big, timbered bottom through which 
flowed a small stream named Hot Spring Water. 

187 



Rising Wolf 

On the following day Red Crow took me to the 
head of it, only a few miles from its junction with 
Yellow River, and there I saw my first hot spring. 
It was very large, and deep, and the water so hot 
that I could not put my hand in it. 

Our camp here was at the foot, and east end 
of the Yellow Mountains. In the gap between 
them and the Moccasin Mountains, rose the hot 
spring in a beautiful, well grassed valley. Never 
in all my wanderings have I seen quite so good a 
game country as that was, and for that matter 
continued to be for no less than sixty years from 
that time. 

As soon as we went into camp the chiefs put 
the hunting law into effect: from that time no 
one was allowed to hunt buffaloes when and 
where he willed. A watch was kept upon the 
herds, and when one came close to camp the 
chiefs' crier went all among the lodges calling 
out that the herd was near, and that all who 
wished to join in the chase should catch up their 
runners and gather at a certain place. From 

i88 



In the Yellow River Country 

there the hunters would go out under the lead of 
some chief, approach the herd under cover, and 
then dash into it and make a big run, generally 
killing a large number of the animals. The strict 
observance of this law meant plenty of buffalo 
meat for all the people all the time, secured close 
to camp instead of far out on the winter plains. 
There was no law regarding the hunting of the 
mountain game, the elk, deer, and bighorns. 
They were not killed in any great number, for 
they became poor in winter, whereas the buf- 
faloes retained their thick layer of fat until 
spring. And buffalo meat was by far the best, 
the most nutritious, the most easily digested. 
One never tired of it, as he did of the meat of 
other game. 

When the leaves began to fall the real work of 
the winter was started, the taking of beavers for 
trade at our Mountain Fort. The streams were 
alive with them, and so tame were they that 
numbers were killed with bow and arrow. I 
myself killed several in that way, lying in wait 

189 



Rising Wolf 

for them at dams they were building, or on their 
trails to their wood cutting and dragging opera- 
tions. But when winter came, and the ponds and 
streams froze over and they retired to their snug 
houses in the ponds, and dens in the stream 
banks, the one way then to get them was by 
setting traps, through the ice, at the entrances 
to their homes; they came out daily to their 
sunken piles of food sticks, dragged back what 
they wanted and ate the bark, and then took 
the stripped sticks out into the water, where they 
drifted off with the current. 

By the time real winter set in, about all the 
beavers for miles around had been caught, and 
then most of the trappers rested. Red Crow, 
however, was so anxious to obtain pelts enough 
for the purchase of one of our company guns 
that he would not stop, and finally persuaded his 
father to allow us to go over on the head of 
Arrow River and trap there for a time. Red 
Crow's mother, Sis-tsa-ki, wanted to go with us, 
but Lone Walker said that he could n't possibly 

190 



In the Yellow River Country 

spare his sits-beside-him wife, but another one, 
named Ah-wun-a-ki (Rattle Woman), and Red 
Crow's sister. Mink Woman, were allowed to go 
along to look after our comfort. A small lodge, 
lining and all, was borrowed for our use, and we 
started out in fine shape, taking five pack and 
travois horses to carry our outfit, and each riding 
a good horse. We made Arrow River that day, 
and camped pretty well on the head of it before 
noon the next day. 

**Now, then, mother, and brother, and sister," 
said Red Crow after we had unpacked the horses, 
"we shall eat only the very best food here, and 
to begin, we will have stuffed entrail for our 
evening meal. Put up the lodge, you two, and 
get plenty of wood for the night, and Rising 
Wolf and I will go kill a fat buffalo cow." 

There were a number of small bands of buf- 
faloes in the breaks of the valley, and approach- 
ing the nearest one of them, I shot a fine young 
cow. We butchered it, took what meat we 
wanted, and a certain entrail that was streaked 

191 



Rising Wolf 

its whole length with threads of soft, snow-white 
fat. When we got to camp with our load, Rattle 
Woman took this entrail from us, washed it 
thoroughly in the stream, and brought it back to 
the lodge. She then cut some loin meat, or, as 
the whites call it, porterhouse steak, into small 
pieces about as large as hazel nuts and stuffed 
the entrail with it, the entrail being turned inside 
out in the process. Both ends of the entrail were 
then tied fast with sinew thread, and she placed 
it on the coals to broil, frequently turning it to 
keep it from burning. It was broiled for about 
fifteen minutes, shrinking considerably in that 
time, and was then thrown into a kettle of water 
and boiled for about fifteen minutes, and then 
we each took a fourth of its length and had our 
feast. Those who have never had meat cooked 
in this manner know not what good meat is! 
The threads of white fat on the entrail, it was 
turned inside out, you remember, gave it the 
required richness, and the tying of the ends kept 
in all the rich juices of the meat, something that 

192 



In the Yellow River Country 

cannot be done by any other method of cooking. 
The Blackfoot name for this was is-sap-wot-sists 
(put-inside-entrail). Their name for the Crows 
was Sap-wo, an abbreviation of the word, and I 
have often wondered if they did not learn this 
method of meat cooking from them during some 
time of peace between the two tribes. 

There were so many of us in Lone Walker's 
family that we never had enough is-sap-wot- 
sists, the highest achievement of the meat cook- 
er's art. But here on Arrow River the four of 
us in our snug lodge, with game all about us, had 
it every day, with good portions of dried berries 
that we had taken from the abandoned Crow 
camp. We certainly lived high ! Red Crow had 
four traps, I had five. We set them carefully in 
ponds and along the stream, and each morning 
made the round of them, skinned what beavers 
we caught, and took the hides to the woman and 
girl to flesh and stretch upon rude hoops to dry. 
We had success beyond my wildest dreams, our 
traps averaging six beavers a night. It was 

193 



Rising Wolf 

virgin ground; traps had never been set there, 
the beavers were very unsuspicious and tame, 
and very numerous. The days flew by; our 
eagerness for our work increased rather than 
diminished. I was to be no gainer by it in 
pounds, shiUings, and pence; whatever fur I 
caught was the property of the Company, but 
that made no difference; my ambition was to 
become an expert trapper and plainsman, and in 
that way get a good standing with the Com- 
pany. 

At the end of a month there we had a visit 
from Lone Walker's nephew. The chief had 
become uneasy about us, and had sent him to 
tell us to return. We were doing too well to go 
back then, and answered that we would trail in 
before the end of another month. We were 
really in no danger; the weather was cold, except 
for an occasional Chinook wind, there was con- 
siderable snow on the ground, and even in mild 
winters war parties were seldom abroad. So we 
trapped on and on, killed what meat we wanted, 

194 



In the Yellow River Country 

— oh, it was a happy time to me. Nor were our 
evenings around the lodge fire the least of it. My 
companions night after night told stories of the 
gods ; stories of the adventures and the bravery 
of heroic Blackfeet men and women, all very 
interesting and instructive to me. At last came 
a second summons from Lone Walker for us to 
return, and this time we heeded it; we had any- 
how pretty well cleaned out the beavers, getting 
only one or two a night for some time back. 
But Red Crow had to go in for more horses be- 
fore we could move, the horses we had with us 
not being enough to pack our catch, and the 
lodge and other things. We took in with us, in 
ten skin bales, two hundred and forty beaver 
skins and nine otter skins, of which a few more 
than half were mine ! Our big catch was the talk 
of the camp for several days. 

Several evenings after our return to camp an 
old medicine man told me that, according to a 
vision he had had, he was collecting enough wolf 
skins for a big, wolf robe couch cover, and that 

I9S 



Rising Wolf 

I could go with him the next morning if I would 
like to see how he caught the animals. He had 
completed his trap the day before, and thought 
that there were already in it all the wolves that 
he needed. 

Of course, I wanted to learn all I could about 
trapping, and so rode down the valley with him 
the next morning. About three miles below 
camp we entered a big, open bottom and he 
pointed to his trap, away out in the center of it. 
In the distance it appeared to be a round corral, 
and so it was, a corral of heavy eight- or nine-foot 
posts set closely together in the ground, and 
slanting inward at an angle of thirty or forty 
degrees. At the base the corral was about twelve 
feet in diameter. In one place a pile of rocks and 
earth was heaped against it, and when I saw that 
I did not need the old man's explanation of 
how he caught the wolves; they jumped into 
the corral from the earth slant to the top of it, 
enticed there by a pile of meat, and, once in, 
they could not jump high enough to get out. 

196 



In the Yellow River Country 

Several wolves that were hanging about the 
corral ran away at our approach, and as we came 
close we could see that there were wolves in the 
corral. We dismounted, climbed the earth slope 
and looked in, and I could hardly believe my 
eyes when I saw that it held thirteen big wolves 
and a dead coyote. The latter had undoubtedly 
been the first to jump down for the bait, and the 
wolves had come later, and killed him. The 
wolves pretended to pay no attention to us, as 
we looked down upon them, milling around and 
sticking their noses into the interstices of the 
posts, but they had wary eyes upon us all the 
same. The old man got out his bow, and some 
all-wood arrows, the sharp tips fire hardened, and 
shot the wolves one by one without a miss, each 
shaft striking at one side of the backbone just 
back of the ribs and ranging down and forward 
into heart and lungs. Some of the animals 
struggled a bit, but all died without a whimper. 
When the last one fell he removed two posts 
that had simply been tied to those set firmly in 

197 



Rising Wolf 

the ground, and dragged the animals out through 
the opening one by one. I helped him skin them. 

"There! I wanted eight, I have thirteen 
skins. My work is done; it is now for my 
woman to tan them and make the robe," he 
exclaimed. 

"You will not replace the two posts, and put 
in fresh bait for more wolves?" I asked. 

"No, I have all that I need," he answered. 
"Eight are enough for a big robe. I shall lie 
upon it, sleep upon it, and the strength that is 
in the wolves will become my strength, so my 
vision told me. I am well satisfied." 

"And I am glad to have learned how to catch 
wolves," I told him, and we packed the skins 
upon our horses and went home. Years after- 
ward, along in the 6o's and 70's, when wolf skins 
went up to five dollars each, I somewhat im- 
proved upon the old man's corral trap, making 
mine of logs laid up to form a hollow pyramid 
about ten by sixteen feet at the base, and four by 
ten feet at the top. This was much more quickly 

198 



In the Yellow River Country 

and easily built than the stake corral, which in- 
volved the digging of a deep trench in which to 
set the stakes, and the building of an incline to 
the top. The wolves did not hesitate to step up 
from one to another of the inslanting logs and 
jump down upon the quantities of meat I placed 
inside, and there I had them. During one 
winter at St. Mary's Lakes, the winter of 1872- 
73, my sons and I caught more than seven hun- 
dred wolves in our pyramid log trap ! 

Although we saw nothing more of the Crows 
after their attack upon us, I kept thinking about 
them all the time. The big war party that had 
gone to raid their herds returned after a month 
or so without a single horse. They reported that 
the enemy was encamped some distance up the 
Bighorn River, and that their horses were under 
so heavy a guard both night and day that they 
had not dared attempt to stampede them. Be- 
fore real winter set in another party of our war- 
riors went out, and had no better success. The 
Crows were still close herding their horses in the 

199 



Rising Wolf 

daytime, and keeping them in well guarded 
corrals at night. 

It was in our lone camp on Arrow River that 
this thought came to me : If the Blackfeet would 
only make peace with the Crows, the latter 
might then accompany us north and trade at our 
post. I asked myself if it was in any way possible 
for me to accomplish this. Well I knew what a 
grand coup it would be for me if I could ride into 
the post and say to the factor: "Here I am, re- 
turned with a good knowledge of the Blackfoot 
language. I have been far, and seen much. I 
have had the Pi-kun-i and the Crows, after a 
desperate fight, make peace with one another, 
and have induced that far tribe to come and 
trade with us. They are here!" 

Well, when I thought that, I became so excited 
that it was long before I could sleep. I thought 
about it all the next day, and determined to 
speak to Red Crow about it. When evening 
came, and we had eaten our fill of is-sap-wot- 
sists, and were resting on our soft couches, I said 

200 



In the Yellow River Country 

to him: "Brother, how is peace made with an 
enemy tribe? Tell me all about it!" 

"Ai! You shall know," he answered. "If 
there is much talk of peace, the chiefs get to- 
gether and council about it, and if they decide 
that it will be good to make peace with the 
enemy, they send messengers with presents of 
pipes and tobacco to the enemy chiefs, asking 
that they smoke the pipe. If the enemy chiefs 
accept the pipe, and smoke the tobacco with it, 
then their answer is that they will be glad to 
make peace, and they tell the messengers where 
they and their people will meet our chiefs and 
our people, and make the peace." 

"If your father and the other chiefs will make 
peace with the Crows, will you go with me to 
their camp?" I asked. 

"I don't know that I want peace with them! 
It is good to have enemies to fight and count 
coup upon; that is what makes us men, brave 
warriors!" he exclaimed. 

"Yes! And oh, how many poor and unhappy 

201 



Rising Wolf 

widows and fatherless children!" Mink Woman 
put in, much to my surprise. 

"Brother, you shall know my heart!" I went 
on. *'I want this peace to be made for two 
reasons. First, for the sake of the women and 
children, and all the old, dependent upon the 
hunters for their food and shelter. Second, I 
want the Crows to go north with us and trade 
at our post. I want all this very much. Now, 
say that you will help me; that you will do all 
that you can toward making the peace!" 

"Oh, Brother! As you love me, say yes!" 
Mink Woman cried. 

"We all want peace, we women! Peace with 
all tribes!" said Rattle Woman. 

"Well, I say yes. I will do what I can. Not 
that I want peace, but because you ask me to 
help you!" he answered. 

So it was that, upon our return to camp, we 
began to urge Lone Walker to make peace with 
the Crows. At first he just laughed at us. Then 
got cross whenever we mentioned the subject, 

202 



In the Yellow River Country 

and went ofif visiting to be rid of us. But we kept 
at him, with a larger and larger following of 
women, and even men, and at last he called the 
council, and after long argument the chiefs 
decided to send peace messengers to the Crow 
camp as soon as the first geese arrived in the 
spring. Mad Plume was to be the lead messen- 
ger, because it was his sister who had married 
into the Crow tribe. Another was Ancient Otter 
(Mis-sum-am-un-is) and Red Crow and I the 
other two. Lone Walker at first declared that 
we should not go; that the mission was too 
dangerous for boys to undertake; far more dan- 
gerous than going on a raid. But in that, too, 
we had our way. On a sunny, although cold day 
in March, a flock of geese was seen flying north 
over the camp, and the next day we started, well 
mounted, with an extra robe each, and the peace 
pipe and tobacco in a roll upon Mad Plume's 
back, beside his bow and arrow case. 

Yes! You shall know all: As we rode out of 
camp, and I looked back at my comfortable lodge 

203 



Rising Wolf 

home, my heart went way, way down! On the 
previous evening I had been told the tale of some 
peace messengers to the Snakes some years be- 
fore. Upon entering the enemy camp and stat- 
ing their mission, they had been set upon and all 
killed but one, he being told to go straight home 
and tell the Pi-kun-i chiefs that that was the 
Snakes' answer to their offer. That might be, I 
thought, the kind of answer that the Crows would 
give us! 



CHAPTER IX 

THE COMING OF COLD MAKER 

I WELL remember how warm and windless 
that March day was. There were patches of 
snow on the north side of the hills, and in the 
coulees, but otherwise the brown plains were 
bare and dry. The mountains, of course, were 
impassable, so we kept along the foot of them, 
traveling east, and that night camped at the foot 
of the Black Butte. The following morning we 
swung around the butte and headed south by a 
little east, a course that would take us to the 
junction of Elk River and the Bighorn, my com- 
panions said. We crossed the Musselshell River 
at noon or a little earlier, and that night slept 
upon the open plain. The weather continued 
fine. The next morning also broke clear and 
warm and cloudless. We started on at sunrise 
and, topping a ridge. Mad Plume pointed to 
some dark breaks away off to the south, and told 

20S 



Rising Wolf 

me that they marked the course of Elk River. 
I estimated that we were about twenty miles 
from them. 

At about ten o'clock we marked a big wedge 
of gray geese coming north, and Red Crow, point- 
ing to them, exclaimed: "See the sun's messen- 
gers! He sends them north to tell us that he is 
coming to drive Cold Maker back to his always- 
winter land ! " 

He had no more than said that than the geese 
suddenly broke their well-ordered wedge lines 
and, shrilly honking, turned and went straight 
south on wild, uneven wings ! 

"Ha! They have seen Cold Maker coming! 
Yes! He is coming; I can smell him!" Mad 
Plume exclaimed, and brought his horse to a 
stand and looked to the north. 

So did we, and saw a black belt of fog all across 
the horizon and right down upon the ground, and 
coming south with frightful speed. It had ad- 
vanced as far as the north slope of the Snowy 
Mountains when we turned and saw it, and even 

206 



The Coming of Gold Maker 

as we looked they were lost in its blackness! 
The air suddenly became strong with the odor 
of burning grass. I had never seen anything like 
it. The swiftly moving, black fog bank, appar- 
ently turning over and over like a huge roller and 
blotting out the plain and mountains, frightened 
me, and I asked my companions what it meant. 

" Fearful wind, cold, and snow ! Cold Maker is 
bringing it! He hides himself in his black 
breath!" Red Crow told me. 

"We have to ride hard! Unless we can get to 
the timber we are gone !" Mad Plume cried, and 
away we went as though we were trying to out- 
ride a big war party. And then suddenly that 
black fog bank struck us and instead of fog it 
was a terrific storm cloud! The wind all but 
tore us from our horses ; fine, hard snow swirled 
and beat into our eyes, almost blinding us, and 
the air became bitterly cold. I marveled at the 
sudden change from sunny spring to a winter 
blizzard. Like my companions, I had on a pair 
of soft leather moccasins, and over them a pair 

207 



Rising Wolf 

of buffalo robe moccasins, and on my hands 
were robe mittens, but for all their thickness and 
warmth both hands and feet began to numb in 
the terrible cold of the storm. 

Mad Plume led us, we following close in single 
file. In front of me, not ten feet away. Red 
Crow and his horse were but dim shadows in the 
driving snow. I saw him dismount and begin 
running beside his horse, and I got down and did 
likewise. And so, alternately on foot and riding 
we went on and on until it seemed to me that 
we had traveled thrice the distance to the river 
breaks that we had seen so plainly before the 
storm came up. At last Mad Plume stopped and 
we crowded around him. He had to shout to 
make himself heard. "What think you.^" he 
asked. "Is the wind still from the north?" 

We could not answer that. To me it seemed to 
be coming from all directions at once. 

"If Cold Maker has changed it we are sure to 
become lost and die. If he still blows it south we 
should soon get to shelter," he said, and led on. 

208 



The Coming of Gold Maker 

"We are lost!" I kept saying to myself as we 
ran, and rode, on and on for what seemed to me 
hours and hours, the snow at last becoming so 
deep that we were obliged to remain on our 
horses. But just as I felt that I was beginning to 
freeze, that there was no longer any use in trying 
to keep going, we began to descend a steep slope, 
and at the foot of it rode into a grove of big 
cottonwoods and out of the terrible wind ! Mad 
Plume led us into a deep part of the woods where 
grew great clumps of tall willows, and we dis- 
mounted. "Ha! We survive! And now for 
comfort : a lodge, fire, food ! Hobble your horses 
and get to work!" he cried. 

I could n't hobble mine, my hands were so 
numb that I could do nothing with them; so I 
ran around swinging them and clapping them 
together until they became warm. I then cared 
for my horse, and with good will helped my 
companions gather material, dry poles, dead 
branches, brush, and armfuls of tall rye grass for 
a small lodge. We soon had it up and a good 

209 



Rising Wolf 

fire going. The cold air rushed in through a 
thousand little spaces between the poles; we 
made a lodge lining of our pishimores — pieces of 
buffalo robe that we used for saddle blankets — 
and sat back on our rye grass couches and were 
truly comfortable, and very thankful that Cold 
Maker had not overcome us! Presently one of 
our horses nickered, and Red Crow went out to 
learn the cause of it. "A big herd of elk has 
come in!" he called to us, and we all ran out and 
followed him on their trail; they had passed 
within fifty yards of the lodge. We soon saw 
them standing in a thick patch of willows, heads 
down, and bodies all humped up with the cold. 
They paid no attention to our approach and we 
moved right up close to them and shot down 
four with bows and arrows. We skinned them 
all, taking the hides for more lodge covering, and 
cut a lot of meat from a fat, dry cow that I had 
killed, and then we were prepared to weather the 
storm, no matter how long it should last. 
The terrible wind and snow lasted all that 

2IO 



The Coming of Gold Maker 

night and far into the afternoon of the following 
day, and when it ceased the weather remained 
piercingly cold. When the sun came out I took 
up my gun and went for a walk, and going 
through the timber looked out upon a great 
river, the Sieur de la Verendrie's La Roche Jaune^ 
(the Yellowstone). He had seen it, where it 
merged with the Missouri, in 1744, and upon his 
return to Montreal told of the mighty flow of its 
waters from the snows of the Shining Mountains. 
How many times I had heard my grandfather 
and others speak of it, and even talk of an expedi- 
tion to explore its vast solitudes to its source. 
They were sure that they would be well rewarded 
with furs. The very name of the river suggested 
riches ; rich mines of gold and silver ! And here 
I was, actually upon the shore of this great river 
of the West, looking out upon its frozen stretches, 
and in quest of neither furs nor gold, but of 
peace between two warring tribes! I said to 
myself that the Sieur de la Verendrie and his 
men, and Lewis and Clark and their men had 

211 



Rising Wolf 

seen the mouth of the river, but that mine was 
the honor of first seeing its upper reaches, and 
oh, how proud of that I was! I did not learn 
until long afterward that upon their return 
journey from the Western Ocean, a part of the 
Lewis and Clark expedition had struck across 
the plains to the river, and followed it down to 
the Missouri. 

I returned to the lodge to find my companions 
roasting our evening meal of elk ribs, and was 
soon eating my large share of the fat meat. 
When that was over we made plans for con- 
tinuing our journey. While I had been out at 
the river, Mad Plume had climbed to the rim of 
the plain for a look at the country, and found 
that we were not far above the mouth of the 
Bighorn. 

Said Mad Plume now: "No matter how cold 
it is in the morning, we must start on. The 
colder it is the safer we will be, for we will not 
likely be discovered by the Crow hunters, and 
that is what I most fear, discovery of us while 

212 



The Coming of Gold Maker 

traveling, and sudden attack upon us. I think 
that if we can reach the edge of the camp with- 
out being seen, we can go on through it to the 
chief's lodge safely enough; the people will be 
so curious to know why we have come that they 
will not then fall upon us." 

"We can travel nights and escape being seen," 
said Ancient Otter. 

" But we can't cover up our tracks ; this fall of 
snow will last for some days. Well, we will make 
an early start, and anyhow keep traveling in the 
daytime if we find it possible," Mad Plume de- 
cided, and started to talk about other matters. 

After a time Ancient Otter said: "Our camp- 
ing here reminds me of the time that we made 
peace with the Crows just below, at the mouth of 
the Bighorn, and the young Crow, Little Wolf, 
with whom I became very friendly. I wonder if 
he is still living? I did not see him when we had 
that fight, some moons back. If he is still alive 
I know that he will be with us for making peace. 
I must tell you about him: 

213 



Rising Wolf 

"On the evening of the day that we made 
peace, he invited me to dance with him and his 
friends, and I had a pleasant time. A day or 
two after that I asked him to one of our dances. 
Then we visited often in his lodge and in mine, 
and we became close friends. One day he said 
to me, in signs, of course, the Crows are fine sign 
talkers, 'We are five young men going south on a 
raid ; you get together four of your friends and 
join us.' 

"Two or three days after that we started, five 
Crows and five of us. Little Wolf and I joint 
leaders of the party. We went on foot, traveling 
at night, taking our time; we had the whole sum- 
mer before us. We followed up the Bighorn al- 
most to its head, then crossed a wide, high ridge 
and struck a stream heading in several mountain 
canyons, and running east into the great plain. 
At the mouth of one of the canyons we discovered 
a big camp of the enemy. We came upon it 
unexpectedly, soon after daylight, and after 
crossing a wide, level stretch of plain. Looking 

214 



The Coming of Gold Maker 

down from the edge of the cHff we had come to, 
there was the camp right under us. People were 
already up and moving about, some of the men 
preparing to ride out to hunt. We dared not 
attempt to go back across the plain; there was 
but one thing for us to do; we wriggled down 
into a patch of cherry brush just below the top 
of the cliff and in a coulee that broke it, and felt 
safe enough except for the fact that the brush 
was heavy with ripe fruit; some women and 
children might come up to gather it. 

"The cliff was broken down in many places, 
more a steep slope of boulders than a cliff, and 
it was not high. From where we sat in the brush 
the nearest lodges of the camp were no more than 
long bow shot from us. We could see the people 
plainly and hear them talking. They were the 
Spotted Horses People. ^ 

"The lodge nearest us was very large, new, 
and evidently the lodge of a medicine man, for 

^ Kish-tsi-pim-i-tup-i. Spotted Horses People. The 
Cheyennes. 

215 



Rising Wolf 

it was painted with figures of two long snakes 
with plumes on their heads. A number of women 
lived in it ; they kept coming out and going back, 
but their man never once appeared. 

"The horses of the camp were grazing in the 
valley of the stream both above and below it and 
we looked at them with longing, for we could see 
that many of them were of the spotted breed. 
After a time a boy on a big, dancing, spotted 
stallion drove a large band of horses up in front 
of the snake medicine lodge and then the medi- 
cine man came out to look at them. He was a 
very tall and heavily built man. He wore a cow 
leather wrap, medicine painted. My Crow 
friend nudged me, pointed to the big stallion 
and then signed to me: 'I shall take that horse 
to-night, and others with him!' 

"I laughed, and signed back, 'You don't 
know that for sure. I may be the one to seize 
him!' 

"The medicine man was talking to the boy on 
the stallion, louder and louder until his voice 

216 



The Coming of Gold Maker 

became like the roar of a wounded bear in our 
ears. He suddenly reached up and seized the 
boy by the arm, dragged him from the stallion, 
and then picking up a big stick began to beat 
him with it. We groaned at the awful sight; 
almost we cried out at it, we who never strike 
our sons. The women had come out of the lodge ; 
they were crying, no doubt begging the man to 
let the boy go, but he paid no attention to them, 
nor to the crowd of people hurrying toward him 
from all parts of the camp. He beat and beat 
the boy, at last struck him on the head and he fell 
as though dead; and at that the women ran 
forward and lifted him and hurried him into a 
near-by lodge. The man watched them go, then 
took up his fallen wrap and went into his lodge. 
Said my Crow friend to me, in signs, 'We must 
make that man pay big for beating the boy. He 
shall lose his horses, all of them, and his medicine, 
too!' 

" 'Yes! Let us, you and I, take all his horses, 
and our men take others as they will. But his 

217 



Rising Wolf 

medicine, no, not that; it would bring us bad 
luck,' I answered. 

"All that long, hot day, thirsty, hungry, we 
sat there in the patch of cliff brush watching the 
enemy camp and its horse herds. We saw noth- 
ing more of the beaten boy, and the medicine 
man did not appear again until nearly sunset. 
He then went down the valley to his herd, which 
had been allowed to graze back to its feeding 
ground, and caught out of it the stallion, rode 
it home and picketed it close to his lodge. Other 
men brought in one or two of their horses for 
early morning use. The sun set. The moon 
came up. We climbed back to the top of the 
cliff, went along it for some distance, and then 
down into the valley below the camp to water. 
There, where we struck the river, was to be our 
meeting place. After a long wait we scattered 
out. Little Wolf and I going together after the 
medicine man's herd. We had kept constant 
watch on it, and now went straight to it and 
drove it to the meeting place. Some of our com- 

218 



The Coming of Cold Maker 

panions were already there with their takings. 
We left the herd for them to hold, and struck 
out for the camp to get the big stallion. On the 
way up my friend again told me that he would 
take the medicine. I tried to get him to leave it 
alone, but his mind was set; the loss of the 
medicine, he said, should be the man's punish- 
ment for beating the boy. 

"The lodge fires had all died out and the people 
were asleep when we arrived at the edge of the 
camp. We kept close to the foot of the cliff and 
approached the medicine man's lodge. The stal- 
lion was picketed between it and the cliff. Little 
Wolf signed to me to go to it and wait for him 
while he took the medicine, which we could see 
was still hanging on a tripod just back of the 
lodge. Again I signed him not to take it. I 
laid hold of his arm and tried to lead him with 
me toward the horse, but he signed that he would 
have the medicine and I let him go, and went on 
toward the horse. 

" I don't know why I changed my course and 
219 



Rising Wolf 

followed my friend; something urged me to do 
so. I was about twenty steps behind him as he 
went up to the tripod and started to lift the 
medicine sacks from it. As he did so I saw the 
lodge skin suddenly raised and the medicine man 
sprang out from under it and seized him from 
behind. I ran to them as they struggled and 
struck the big man on the head with my gun and 
down he went and lay still. He had never seen 
me, and never knew what hit him. Neither had 
he made any outcry. As soon as he fell we ran to 
the stallion, bridled him with his picket rope and 
sprang upon his back, Little Wolf behind me, 
and still hanging to the medicine sacks. It was 
my intention to make the stallion carry us out 
from the camp as fast as he could go, but there 
was nowhere any outcry — any one in sight, so I 
let him go at a walk until we were some distance 
down the valley, and then hurried him the rest 
of the way to the meeting place. Our com- 
panions were all there with their takings, 
mounted and waiting for us. Little Wolf got 

220 



The Coming of Gold Maker 

down and caught a horse and away we went for 
the north, and it was a big band of horses that 
we drove ahead of us. 

"At daybreak we stopped to change to fresh 
horses, and as I turned loose the stallion I signed 
to Little Wolf: 'There! Take your horse!' 

" ' I shall never put a rope on him ! You saved 
my life; that enemy would have killed me but for 
you. The horse is yours,' he signed back, and went 
away off our trail and hung the medicine sacks 
in the brush where any pursuers we might have 
would never see them. He gave them to the sun. 

"Well, when we got back to the mouth of the 
Bighorn we found that the Pi-kun-i had started 
for the Snow Mountains several days before, so 
after one night in the Crow camp we five took 
up their trail. I spent that last night in Little 
Wolfs lodge, and we planned to meet often 
again, and to go on more raids together. His 
last words, or signs, rather, to me were : ' Do not 
forget that no matter what others may do, you 
and I shall always be friends!' 

221 



Rising Wolf 

"'Yes! Friends always,' I answered, and 
rode away. I have never seen him since that 



time." 



So ended Ancient Otter's story. It heartened 
me. If his friend was still aHve — and he cer- 
tainly had not been killed in the big fight — he 
would be with us for making peace, as well as 
Mad Plume's sister. Said Mad Plume to me: 
**You now know why Ancient Otter is with us. 
He told the story to you; we knew it!" 

The next morning broke very cold ; the air was 
full of fine frost flakes ; the snow was drifted and 
in places very deep. We unhobbled our horses, 
saddled them and struck off through the timber 
toward the mouth of the Bighorn soon after 
sunrise. An hour or so later we crossed the river 
on the ice, and turned up the valley of the Big- 
horn. Here I again said to myself that I was 
traversing country that people of my race had 
never seen, but I was mistaken. I learned years 
afterward that a Lewis and Clark man, named 
Cotter, had come west again in 1807, and had 

222 



The Coming of Cold Maker 

trapped on the headwaters of the Bighorn, and 
followed it down to its junction with the Yellow- 
stone. 

We saw great numbers of the different kinds 
of game that morning, and the sight that most 
impressed me was the trees full of grouse, or 
prairie chickens, as the whites call them. We 
passed hundreds of cottonwoods in which the 
birds were almost as plentiful as apples in an 
apple tree. They sat motionless upon their 
perches, their feathers all fluffed out, and paid 
not the slightest attention to us as we passed 
under them. 

"They are cold and unhappy now, but in the 
next moon they will be dancing, and happy 
enough," Red Crow said to me. He saw that I 
thought he was joking, and went on: "Yes, 
dancing! They gather in a circle on the plain 
and the males dance and the females look on. 
Oh, they have just as good times dancing as we 
do." 

He was right. Many a time since then I have 
223 



Rising Wolf 

stopped and watched the birds dance for a long 
time. It is a very interesting sight. After the 
long years I have passed in the plains and moun- 
tains, studying the habits of all wild creatures, I 
become impatient when I hear people speak of 
them as dumb creatures. Dumb! Why, they 
have their racial languages as well as we! If 
they had n't, do you think, for instance, that the 
grouse could have learned their peculiar dance? 
Or the beavers how to build their wonderful 
dams and houses? 

The snow was so deep that we made no more 
than fifteen miles that day. We hobbled the 
tired horses long before sunset, and put up an- 
other war lodge and made ourselves as comfort- 
able as was possible. We had seen no signs of 
the Crows during the day. 

It was the next afternoon that we sighted 
them, or rather, one rider turning down into the 
valley from the plain, and several miles ahead of 
us. We happened at the time to be in the upper 
end of a long grove, and, while we could see him 

224 



The Coming of Gold Maker 

plainly, we were sure that the trees screened us 
from him, bare though they were. 

"The sun is almost down, he rides as if he 
were in no hurry; I think that the camp cannot 
be far away," said Ancient Otter. 

"Ai! That is my thought," Mad Plume 
agreed, and led on, the rider having passed from 
our sight around a bend in the valley. We 
crossed a strip of open bottom, entered another 
grove which circled clear around the bend, and 
presently, looking out from the upper end of it, 
saw the great camp. It was pitched in a wide, 
open bottom about a mile from us and was in 
two sections, or circles, one, of course, that of the 
River Crows, the other the Mountain Crows. 
Looking out upon them, and the swarms of 
people passing in all directions among the lodges, 
I shivered a bit. Not until that moment had I 
been even doubtful of the success of our mission. 
Now a great fear came over me. Many of those 
people I saw were mourning for the loss of some 
dear one in the attack upon us some months 

225 



Rising Wolf 

back. I doubted that they would ever give us 
time to state the reason of our coming; they 
would kill us as soon as they saw that we were 
the hated Pi-kun-i! And then, to add to my 
fear, Mad Plume turned to Ancient Otter and 
asked: "Brother, which one, think you, is the 
camp of the Mountain Crows?" 

"I can't make out for sure, but I think it is the 
first one. We have to make sure of that. If 
we enter the camp of the River Crows we shall 
find no one there to help us ; right there will be 
our end!" 

"Your sister and Little Wolf are in the 
Mountain Crow camp ? " I asked Mad Plume. 

"Yes!" he answered, very shortly, and con- 
tinued staring thoughtfully at the camps. 

Said Ancient Otter: "Oh, if we could only be 
a little nearer to the lodges, I could tell. Little 
Wolf's lodge is on the west side of the camp circle, 
and right next it, the first one to the south, is a 
lodge painted with two wolves. The Crow wolf 
medicine." 

'226 



The Coming of Gold Maker 

"Yes, I remember that lodge. It is five lodges 
north of my sister's lodge," said Mad Plume. 

"Well, one thing we can do! Unless we freeze 
to death!" Mad Plume went on. "We can stay- 
right here until night, then sneak into camp and 
find my sister and your friend and get them to 
help us, to protect us until we are in the chief's 
lodge." 

We all agreed that that was the only thing 
to do, and began our chilly wait. Red Crow 
pointed to the many bands of horses grazing 
between the camp and us, and on both slopes of 
the valley. "What a chance for us if we were 
raiders!" he exclaimed. 

"Don't talk foolishness at this time!" Mad 
Plume told him. "It is best that you pray the 
gods for help in what we are about to under- 
take!" And with that he voiced^a short, earnest 
prayer to the sun, to Old Man, and his own medi- 
cine animal — "thou little underwater animal" — • 
he called it, to preserve us from all the dangers 
that we were to face there in the enemy camp. 

227 



Rising Wolf 

And when he had finished I cried out even as the 
others did: "Ai! Spuhts-uh Mut-tup-i, kim-o- 
ket-an-nan!" (Yes! Above People, pity have 
for us ! ) 

Hai ! Hai ! But it was cold ! Our horses stood 
humped up and miserable, the sweat freezing on 
their hair. 

"We have to hobble them and turn them loose 
to graze, else they will freeze to death," said Mad 
Plume. 

"Yes, we may as well do that. If all goes well 
with us we'shall find them safe enough hereabout, 
and if we never come back for them, why, they 
will live anyhow!" said Ancient Otter. So we 
turned them out, and set our saddles and ropes 
and pishimores in a little pile, and stamped about 
and swung our arms trying to keep warm. 

Oh, how slowly, and yet how fast the sun went 
down that evening. But down it went at last, 
and as soon as the valley was really dark we 
started for the camp. As we neared it Mad 
Plume's last words were: "Remember this: 

228 



The Coming of Gold Maker 

You are to expect abuse and you are to stand 
it until you see that there is no hope for us. 
Then, die fighting!'^ 

Cheering words, were n't they! 



CHAPTER X 

MAKING PEACE WITH THE CROWS 

WE approached the lower camp, the lodges 
all yellow glow from the cheerful fires 
within. And a cheerful camp it was ; men and 
women singing here and there, several dances 
going on, children laughing and playing — and 
some squalling — men shouting out to their 
friends to come and smoke with them. We 
could see many dim figures hurrying through 
the cold and darkness from one lodge to another. 
We approached the west side of the circle at a 
swift walk, just as though we belonged there — 
knew where we were going; in that piercing cold 
to loiter, to hesitate, would be to proclaim that 
we were strangers in the camp. The circle was 
fifteen or twenty well separated lodges in width, 
so we had to go far into it in order to see the in- 
side lodges. Ancient Otter led us, looking for 
the lodge of the painted wolves. We were well 

230 



Making Peace with the Grows 

into the circle when a man came out of a lodge 
that we were just passing, and my heart gave a 
big jump when the door curtain was thrust aside 
and he stepped out. He saw us, of course, but 
turned and went off the way we had come, and 
I breathed more freely. But we had not gone 
two lodges farther when we saw some one coming 
straight toward us. We had to keep on. We 
drew our robes yet more closely about our faces. 
It was an anxious moment. We were due to 
meet the person right in front of a well-lighted 
lodge, and were within a few steps of it when a 
number of men inside struck up a song. When 
opposite our leader the person said something, 
and half stopped ; but Ancient Otter pretended 
that he did not hear and kept right on, we fol- 
lowing. Then, just as I was passing the person, 
he did stop and stare at us I I dared not look 
back, and oh, how I wanted to! I expected every 
step I made to hear a shout of alarm that would 
arouse the camp. But no! We went peacefully 
on, and presently Ancient Otter led us out of the 

231 



Rising Wolf 

circle, and away out from the lodges, and when 
at a safe distance stopped and told us that we 
had been in the wrong camp; the camp of the 
River Crows. 

"Nevermind! We have had two escapes ! The 
gods are with us ! Lead on ! " Mad Plume told him. 

"Yes, I go! Follow, brothers, and pray! 
Pray for help!" he exclaimed. 

We made a wide circle around to the other 
camp to avoid any persons who might be going 
from one to the other of the two, and presently 
struck it on the west side of the circle. No one 
was in sight so we went straight in among the 
lodges and soon saw the one of the wolf medicine, 
the light of the fire within revealing plainly the 
big wolf painting on the right of the doorway. 
It had the appearance of great ferocity, the wide 
mouth showing long, sharp fangs. Ancient Otter 
stopped and pointed to the lodge and said to us 
in a low tone: "There it is, the wolf medicine 
lodge, and that one just to the north of it is my 
friend's lodge. Come ! We will go in ! 'V 

232 



Making Peace with the Grows 

"No! It is best that we go to my sister's 
lodge first. We will need some one to interpret 
for us at once, and I am sure that by this time 
she speaks Crow," said Mad Plume. 

Now, this should all have been arranged be- 
forehand, for while we stood there talking a man 
suddenly came around a lodge behind us and 
called out to us something or other in his lan- 
guage. We pretended not to hear him. 

"You have n't time to get to your sister's 
lodge! Follow me!" said Ancient Otter, and we 
started on at a swift walk. But the Crow came 
faster; something in our appearance, and our 
silence when he addressed us had aroused his 
suspicions. As Ancient Otter raised the door 
curtain of the lodge and the light streamed out 
full in his face, the man recognized him as one 
of the hated Pi-kun-i and shouted — as I after- 
wards learned — that the enemy were in the camp, 
and as we hurried into the lodge we heard on all 
sides of it the answering, rallying cry of the 
warriors. 

233 



Rising Wolf 

When Ancient Otter stepped into the lodge 
and the Crow, Little Wolf, saw who it was, he 
sprang up and embraced and kissed him, then 
did the same to us and motioned us to seats. 
We took them, but it was hard to do so with the 
rallying cries of the warriors and screams of 
frightened women and children ringing in our 
ears. As soon as we were seated Little Wolf 
signed his friend: "You have come! I am 
glad!'' 

"I am glad to see you! We are sent by our 
chiefs to propose peace to your chiefs. Help us! 
First, send for the woman of the Pi-kun-i, sister 
of the chief there. Mad Plume." 

"Yes!" Little Wolf signed, and spoke to one 
of his women, and she hurried out. He spoke to 
another, and as she went out he signed to us, 
"I am sending that one for our chiefs! Now, 
sit you here ! I go to stand outside and keep the 
crazy warriors back." And with that he 
snatched up his bow case, drew out the bow and a 
handful of arrows, and ran outside, thrusting 

234 



Making Peace with the Grows 

back a man entering as he reached the doorway. 
He went none too soon; a great crowd was 
gathering about the lodge, shouting angrily, cry- 
ing for our scalps, no doubt. We held our 
weapons ready and kept our eyes on the lodge 
skin, expecting every moment that the warriors 
would raise it and pour in upon us. I tell you, 
that was an anxious time. I must have shown 
that I was terribly frightened, for Mad Plume 
gave my shoulder a pat and said to me: "Take 
courage, younger brother, take courage!" 

Just then the door curtain was thrust aside 
and a handsome young woman rushed in, and 
Mad Plume sprang up and embraced her. She 
clung to him, crying: "Oh, my brother! What a 
risk for you to come here at this time! Oh, I 
hope that all will be well with us ! My man is 
out there with Little Wolf, holding back the 
warriors! Oh, why don't the chiefs come! Oh, 
they have come! Listen!" 

The noise outside had suddenly died down; 
some one was addressing the crowd in a deep and 

23S 



Rising Wolf 

powerful voice, and in a minute or two she said 
to us: "It is the head chief, Spotted Bull. He 
commands his head warriors to see that you are 
not harmed, and tells the others to all go home!" 

And then, a little later: "They are going; 
they are minding him! Oh, I am glad! For the 
present you are safe!" 

Again, the door curtain was raised and Little 
Wolf came in, followed by a young man who 
hurried to greet Mad Plume. Red Crow told me 
that it was his brother-in-law. In turn he gave 
us greeting. Then Little Wolf's wives returned, 
and he ordered them to hurry and set food before 
us, which they presently did, big wooden bowls 
full of boiled boss ribs of buffalo. I should have 
been hungry; perhaps I was, but I was so ex- 
cited and anxious that I ate only a few mouthfuls. 
Presently we heard some one talking loudly out- 
side the doorway. Little Wolf answered him, 
and then spoke to Mad Plume's sister, telling 
her to interpret, and she said to us: "Spotted 
Bull sends you word that the chiefs will council 

236 



Making Peace with the Grows 

together to-morrow morning, and then have a 
talk with you." 

"Yes. I told Spotted Bull that you were 
peace messengers from your chiefs," Little Wolf 
signed to us. 

After the meal was over there was some talk, 
Mad Plume's sister interpreting, and then it 
was decided that Ancient Otter should sleep in 
his friend's lodge, and that we three should be the 
guests of Mad Plume's brother-in-law. Accord- 
ingly we went over to his lodge, big, and well 
fitted out with soft, robe couches, and Mad 
Plume and his sister fell to talking. She first 
had to hear all about her relatives and friends, 
who had died, and how the living were doing. 
She then told about the Crows, and her life with 
them. She said that her man was very kind to 
her, that she was perfectly happy except for the 
fact that, owing to the continuous war between 
the Crows and the Pi-kun-i, she could not occa- 
sionally visit her relatives. As to the last fight, 
she said that a big war party had started out on 

237 



Rising Wolf 

the trail of some Snakes, who had taken a large 
herd of horses, and while after them had dis- 
covered the Pi-kun-i moving out from Arrow 
River without the usual line of warriors in the 
lead of the column, and so had made the attack. 
And at that her man, who was Hstening,mnder- 
standing considerable of her language, told her 
to tell us that the people who had lost relatives 
in the fight were still mourning, and he feared 
that they might win over the chiefs to refuse our 
peace pipe. She added that she thought most of 
the women would want peace, and that she would 
go among them early in the morning, and get 
them to urge their men to talk for it. 

That was about all Red Crow and I heard of 
the talk. Tired out, and made drowsy by the 
comfortable heat of the lodge, a great change 
from the bitter cold that we had experienced, we 
fell asleep. And we slept soundly under the 
assurance that the Crow chief's guards were in 
the lodges on either side of us. 

Early the next morning, right after preparing 
238 



Making Peace with the Grows 

food for us, Mad Plume's sister went out on her 
round of talks for peace, and soon afterward some 
of the Crow men began to drop in for a chat and 
smoke, and especially ask about certain of the 
Pi-kun-i with whom they had become very 
friendly in time of peace. I was surprised and 
please,d at the large number of these visitors; it 
was proof that there were many in the camp who 
would be on the side of peace. Another thing 
that surprised me was the elegance of dress of 
these men. Without exception they wore beauti- 
ful quill-embroidered shirts and leggings and moc- 
casins, garments that our people put on only on 
great occasions. And if anything they were even 
taller, more graceful, and with more pride in 
their bearing than the men of the Blackfeet 
tribes, and that is saying much. They were all 
apparently much interested in me, wanting to 
know all that my friends could tell them about 
my presence in the country, and why one so 
young should be a peace messenger. To that 
last question Mad Plume answered that, when 

239 



Rising Wolf 

the time for it came, I would probably tell my 
reason for being there. After a time Ancient 
Otter came in with his friend, Little Wolf, and 
we anxiously awaited the call from the council 
of chiefs 

When noon came, and there was still no word 
from them, our anxiety increased. Then Mad 
Plume's sister returned and told us to take cour- 
age. Both Spotted Bull and Lone Runner, chief 
of the River Crows, and some of the clan chiefs 
of both tribes, were for accepting the peace pipe, 
but that other clan chiefs, and a good number of 
warriors wanted the pipe sent back. The ob- 
jectors to peace were mostly those who had lost 
relatives in the Arrow River fight. She thought 
that these would eventually do as the head 
chiefs desired. 

It was not until late afternoon that a messen- 
ger called us to the council. We went over to 
the big lodge accompanied by Little Wolf, and 
Mad Plume's brother-in-law and sister, the 
latter to act as interpreter. There was an im- 

240 



Making Peace with the Crows 

mense crowd in the camp, most of the River 
Crows having come up to hear all about the 
peace talk, and many that we passed stared at 
us with anything but friendly eyes. Had it not 
been for our guard of warriors coming right 
behind us, we might never have reached the 
council lodge. 

We were not greeted with smiles or any word 
of welcome when we entered the lodge and took 
the seats left vacant for us, but, not at all 
daunted, Mad Plume leaned forward and placed 
the peace pipe and tobacco in front of Spotted 
Bull, and said: "Lone Walker, your friend, 
sends you this pipe and tobacco, with these 
words: 'Peace is good, and war is bad! Let us 
smoke together and each declare that there shall 
be peace between the Crow Tribes and the 
Blackfeet Tribes.' " 

*'Ai! Learning from our young man. Little 
Wolf, that you had come with an offer of peace 
from our good friend. Lone Walker, we have been 
considering the matter all day," Spotted Bull 

241 



Rising Wolf 

answered. "From the beginning my brother 
there, chief of our brother tribe, and I have 
talked for peace, and so have many of our clan 
chiefs. But a few still hold out that between us 
and the Blackfeet tribes there can be no peace." 

** You mean me when you say that !" exclaimed 
one of the clan chiefs, a big, haughty appearing, 
flashing eyed man. "Yes! I hold out for war, 
war always between us and the Pi-kun-i! And 
I am not alone in that desire ; I can go out in this 
camp and bring you many, very many men who 
think as I do!" 

Now, when Mad Plume's sister had told us 
what this man said. Mad Plume then, much to 
my surprise, told her to say to the chief that he 
would like to have his friend. Rising Wolf, the 
white youth, speak a few words to the council. 
She did so, and Spotted Bull replied, "Yes! 
Let us hear what he has to say!" 

I considered a moment or two. My first 
thought was to tell the council that they were 
not powerful enough to fight the Blackfeet 

242 



Making Peace with the Crows 

tribes, and their Gros Ventre and Sak-si allies. 
But I said to myself that that wouldn't do. 
Nothing had even been said of the flight of the 
Crows, their abandonment of much of their 
property after the Arrow River fight. At last I 
said to the interpreter, " Tell them this for me : 

" I would like to see peace made on account of 
the women and children! In war they suffer, 
not you men. I have been sick ever since that 
Arrow River fight, for I then saw women and 
girls and even children killed as well as men! 
White men do not do that! They would sooner 
die than kill women! They believe that it is 
only cowards who kill women. 

"This is a great country. There is plenty of 
room in it for the Crow tribes and the Blackfeet 
tribes, and game enough upon the plains and in 
the mountains for all. Then why fight? Why 
keep the women and children mourning for loss 
of father and brother and son.? Now, my Red 
Coat chief wants the Crows and the Blackfeet 
and all different tribes to be friends with one 

243 



Rising Wolf 

another, and friendly with him. From the Far 
East he has come with guns, and tobacco, and 
all kinds of goods, and built a white man's 
lodge on Bow River, and he wants you all to 
come there and smoke and feast with him, and 
give him your beaver skins for his guns and other 
things. You Crows can't do that if you are at 
war with the Blackfeet. I say this : Make peace, 
and be happy." 

While the woman was interpreting that I 
asked Mad Plume if it would not be well for him 
to offer to give back to the Crows the lodges and 
things that we had taken after their flight. 

"No. About everything has been used up, 
and they have new lodges. And I don't think 
that they want to be reminded that they fled 
from us," he answered. 

Just then the woman finished speaking and I 
happened to be looking across at the man who 
had declared that he was for war, always war! 
A great change had taken place in him as he 
listened. Instead of hatred and defiance, his eyes 

244 



Making Peace with the Grows 

now expressed great interest, intense desire ; and 
leaning forward he said to Spotted Bull, as I after- 
ward learned, "Lift the pipe ! Fill, and light it !" 

Spotted Bull looked around at the circle and 
asked: "Is that what you all say?" 

"Yes! Yes!" they answered, and he took the 
pipe from its wrappings, cut some of the tobacco, 
mixed it with dried red willow bark, filled the 
bowl, and after lighting the pipe and taking a 
few whiffs, passed it to Mad Plume, saying: 
"Let us smoke together. Tell my good friend. 
Lone Walker, that there shall be peace between 
him and me, between his children and mine, and 
that as soon as it is warm enough for us to travel 
we will go and camp beside him and hold the 
peace council with him and his chiefs." 

Mad Plume took a few whiffs of smoke, then 
started the pipe on the round of the circle, and 
answered: "I am glad to have that word to take 
back to him. All you chiefs here, remember this, 
when you come, my lodge is your lodge. We 
shall have many smokes together!" 

24s 



Rising Wolf 

Suitable replies were made to that. Then the 
fierce chief asked many questions about the Red 
Coats' trading post, and the price in beaver skins 
of different articles. And then, a little later, the 
council broke up and we returned to Little 
Wolf's lodge, much pleased at the success of our 
mission. 

Said Mad Plume's sister, *'It was your talk 
that won them over. Rising Wolf." 

"I am glad of that! I hoped that my talk 
about the poor women would do some good," I 
answered. 

She laughed. "It was your talk about guns 
that they heard, not what you said about the 
women! More than anything else the Crows 
want guns," she said. 

That very evening a Chinook wind set in, so 
we decided to make an early start for home. 
We wanted to get across Elk River, the Yellow- 
stone, before the ice went out. Mad Plume's 
sister was so anxious to see her people again that 
she prevailed upon her man to take her with us, 

246 



Making Peace with the Grows 

lodge and all; and Ancient Otter's friend, Little 
Wolf, came with us with his lodge and outfit, so 
we were quite a party. The two Crow tribes 
were to break camp three days later, and follow 
us. If there were any men still angry that the 
chiefs had accepted the peace pipe, we felt safe 
enough from them now that we had two lodges 
of their people with us, and accordingly we set 
out in high spirits, and, traveling leisurely, ar- 
rived in our own camp five days later. We were 
received with great acclaim, and as soon as it 
was learned that our mission was successful, that 
the Crows would soon be with us, great prepara- 
tions for their reception went forward. Dearly 
they loved these opportunities for the spectacu- 
lar, the dramatic incidents of life, and made the 
most of them. 

When the Crows came, they halted some miles 
out from the river and put on all their finery, the 
men their war costumes, the women their beauti- 
ful, quill-embroidered, elk-tush-decorated gowns. 
Our scouts reported that they were coming, so we 

247 



Rising Wolf 

all dressed in our best and mounting our most 
lively horses went out to meet them. Lone 
Walker and his Bull band of the All Friends 
Society led, of course, all the other bands follow- 
ing. The women remained in camp, all but Mad 
Plume's sister, who rode in the rear of the Bull 
band, ready to act as interpreter. 

We topped the slope up to the plain and found 
the great column of riders right close to us. 
They struck up a mighty song, a Crow song of 
greeting and peace, suddenly halted it, and then 
we sang the Blackfeet song of peace. And so, 
alternately singing, we approached one another, 
and at last met and the chiefs of both sides 
sprang from their horses and embraced one an- 
other. Then said Lone Walker, the woman 
interpreting, "My brothers! Because you and 
your children have come, this is a happy day for 
me and my children. We make you welcome. 
Come. Let us ride in to my lodge and smoke the 
pipe of peace together!" 

Replying for both Crow tribes, Spotted Bull 
248 



Making Peace with the Grows 

then answered: "Your words are straight. This 
is a happy day. We are glad to be with you, 
we shall be glad to smoke the peace pipe with 
you." 

"Then let us mount and ride in. My lodge is 
your lodge. The pipe awaits you there," said 
Lone Walker, and they all mounted and led off, 
and we, holding back, fell in here and there with 
the long column of warriors and escorted them 
to our camp. In every lodge a feast and smokes 
awaited them, and while the chiefs counciled to- 
gether, and smoked the peace pipe, and feasted, 
they were well entertained. And meantime, out 
in the big flat of Warm Spring Creek, their 
women were putting up their camp. The lodges 
were soon set, and then, even as the men were 
doing, the women of both camps renewed friend- 
ships, and exchanged presents and gossip. They 
were all expert sign talkers, as well as their men. 
It was, indeed, a happy time. A number of 
dances were held that afternoon, and I joined in 
the one that my band gave, and some of Lone 

249 



Rising Wolf 

Walker's women told me that I was a very grace- 
ful dancer. Well, I believe that I was. 

On the following morning Lone Walker dis- 
patched messengers to the chief of the Kai-na 
tribe, over on the Missouri, advising him of the 
peace that had been made with the Crows, and 
asking that he and some of his chiefs come over 
to meet the Crow chiefs, and to make plans for 
the return to the fort of the Red Coats. They 
came in due time, and more feasts and smokes, 
and more dances were held in their honor. At 
the council it was decided that the Kai-na, with 
the River Crows, should follow up the Missouri 
to the mountains, and trap northward along 
them, and that we, with the Mountain Crows, 
should go by the way of the gap between the Bear 
Paw and Wolf Mountains to Little River, and 
follow that up to the main range, and thence 
north to the post. 

With the Mountain Crows, then, we crossed 
the Missouri at a place later named by the 
whites, Cow Island, the place where, in 1877, 

250 



Making Peace with the Grows 

the Nez Perces made one of their last stands. 
From there we followed up the Stahk-tsi-kye-e- 
tuk-tai (River-in-the-Middle), which heads in the 
low gap dividing the Bear Paw and the Wolf 
Mountains, and thence went down to Little, or, 
as the whites say. Milk River. And here again 
I was in country that none of my race had ever 
seen. 

Spring had now come. The days were warm 
and sunny, green grass was sprouting, buffaloes 
and antelopes covered the plains on all sides of 
us, the stream was alive with beavers, and so we 
were happy. The Crows had no traps, but never- 
theless they kept gathering in nearly as many 
beaver pelts as we did with traps, simply by 
careful stalking, and long waiting, and good 
shooting with bow and arrows. 

We were more than a month following up the 
river to its head. We then dropped over onto the 
St. Mary's Lakes (the Lakes Inside), trapped 
there for a time, and then went slowly northward, 
and ahead of the Kai-na and the River Crows. 

251 



Rising Wolf 

When the camp was still two days travel from 
the fort, Red Crow and I hurried on and, on 
the morning of the second day, suddenly ap- 
peared before Factor Hardesty as he sat in the 
sun just outside the gate of the fort. 

"Bless me! It is little Hugh Monroe!** he 
cried, springing up and grasping my hand as I 
slid from my horse. "Well, well! Tell me 
quick ! Did you get to the Missouri plains — and 
saw you any traders there?" 

"I have been far beyond the Missouri! Away 
south of it to Elk River, the Sieur de la Veren- 
drie's La Roche Jaune^ you know, and seen not 
one trader!" I answered. But I could not wait 
for him to ask questions. I poured out my tale 
of the vast country I had seen, its wealth of 
furs, our trouble with the Crows, and how we had 
made peace with them and they were coming to 
trade with us ; and how he and the gathering of 
employees behind him did stare at me! 

"When are they coming — the Crows and Pi- 
kun-i?" he asked. 

252 




HUGH MONROE IN HIS OLD AGE 

From a photograph 



Making Peace with the Grows 

"The River Crows and the Kai-na later on, 
the others, the Mountain Crows and the Pi- 
kun-i, to-day," I answered. 

And at that he whirled upon the men and 
cried: ''Hear ye that, now! Two tribes coming 
to-day. Go get your women busy cooking pots of 
meat for a feast to the chiefs. Put pipe and to- 
bacco in my room ! Run up the flag ! Draw the 
shot from the cannon so that we can salute them 
and no one be hurt!'' 

The men flew to do his bidding, and then he 
had me for an hour or more telling him my 
adventures, and even then I had hardly begun. 

"That will do for now! You have done well," 
he said at last, "so very well, my boy, that back 
you go with the Pi-kun-i for another winter in 
the South!" 

And so ended my first year upon the plains. 



THE END 



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